Who says ceasefire is fire being ceased?

Ceasefires are often seen as mere illusions of peace, transforming into a different form of warfare. These agreements are fraught with ambiguities, enabling one side to secure tactical benefits. While diplomats portray ceasefires as victorious mil...

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Ceasefire: a word that promises serenity, a pause, a collective sigh of relief. Yet, it's stashed with diplomatic irony, considering as we see in the context of Hormuz, a ceasefire isn't really the cessation of unfriendly fire. One might imagine generals ordering the suspension of hostilities, a cessation in strikes. Instead, ceasefires are often little more than war by other means that does not include sports. The absurdity lies in the semantics. 'Cease' suggests a halt; 'fire' suggests the thing to be halted. Put together, they should mean, well, no fire. But ceasefires are riddled with caveats, violations and loopholes. They are less about stopping missile or drone strikes than about buying time - to reload, regroup or renegotiate to one's (military) advantage. As we have realised by now, the ceasefire is not a peace treaty but a coffee break for combatants.

Diplomats, of course, dress it up in solemnity. Press releases strum it as 'on the verge of success', as if being on the verge is the destination. Civilians, meanwhile, learn to treat them with suspicion, with the ceasefire becoming a word that means its very opposite. It is the linguistic equivalent of 'jumbo shrimp', a phrase that is held aloft by its own contradictory petard. And, yet, we never cease to marvel at how a ceasefire hardly ceases, long after the fire has not ceased.
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