I mean how the occupation can end. It’s not obvious how that can happen, even though it obviously should. Go on Google Images, then search ‘topography of Israel and the West Bank’. If a nascent civilian government of Palestine falls to Hamas or similar forces then they’d be overlooking Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. They’d have a throughline to Iran via Syria-Lebanon. That’s not a risk Israel can take.
Hamas has little to no influence there
This simply isn’t correct. Hamas operates in much of the West Bank, as do allied groups like the Jenin Brigades and Lion’s Den in Nablus. They’re also enormously popular among West Bank Palestinians.
it is governed by a civilian government that was democratically elected
So democratic that the current President Abbas is currently serving the 19th year of his 4-year term.
In fact, they’ve been trying to hold new elections, something that Israel has been blocking for years now
This is misleading at best. They’re not trying to hold new elections, because every single opinion poll for about 15 years now show that Fatah would lose badly and certainly Hamas would become the new government of the West Bank, which would finally shatter the possibility of there ever being a Palestinian state. That doesn’t serve Fatah or Israel. Israel therefore keeps Fatah on life-support as the least-bad option.
There is little to no violence coming from the West Bank.
Because it’s been suppressed by Fatah in co-operation with Israeli security services who’ve been operating in the West Bank before and after October 7th.
By the way, right at this moment thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank are out marching in support of Hamas and against the killing of Ismail Hainyeh: timesofisrael.com/…/dismay-in-gaza-and-rare-open-…