By: David R. Parsons, ICEJ Senior Vice President & Spokesman

In early October, US President Donald Trump and his special Middle East envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner suddenly announced a new ceasefire and hostage release deal had been reached between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Trump’s 20-point plan for rebuilding Gaza marked a major diplomatic breakthrough for the US after two years of fighting ignited by the Hamas terror invasion into southern Israel on October 7, 2023

The Israeli government and Hamas leaders quickly approved phase one of the plan. Within 72 hours of the Israeli cabinet vote, the last 20 living Israeli hostages were home. It was a day of great rejoicing in Israel, and fell just hours before the start of Simchat Torah, exactly two years on the Hebrew calendar from when the Hamas massacres took place on this same Jewish holiday.

However, ever since the last living hostages were freed, Israelis are taking a closer look at these whirlwind developments and asking some very important questions.

First, is the war really over? And how solid is the ceasefire? After two years of intense conflict on numerous fronts, interrupted by several short-lived ceasefires in Gaza, it is still hard to believe this longest of Israel’s wars has truly ended.

Second, is the Trump plan for Gaza good for Israel? Sure, the last living hostages amazingly made it back alive. But does the multi-phased Trump plan protect Israel’s interests, or will the Arab and Muslim nations involved in its implementation somehow sway Trump to force risky compromises on Israel, especially regarding a Palestinian state.

There are differing views on these questions, and a lot of serious concerns with the plan being expressed by many Israelis and their friends aboard. And yet there are also many benefits for Israel. So, in a real sense the answer comes down to whether one sees the glass half full or half empty.

Taking Stock of Israel’s Longest War
For two years, the war on the Gaza front turned into a long slow grind for the IDF, which was very frustrating for Israelis who are used to swift victories and overwhelming military actions. Indeed, we saw these trademark quick, powerful IDF operations in action during the war on the Lebanese and Iranian fronts. Both Hizbullah and Iran were dealt much faster blows than Hamas in Gaza. The accounts that have emerged so far indicate that the IDF’s intelligence branch and the Mossad focused on countering Hizbullah and Iran, as Hizbullah in particular was deemed to pose a much larger threat to Israel than Hamas. And their military and intelligence operations proved to be the stuff of legends – such as the ‘pager operation’ and the secret drone factory built several years ago inside Iran.

It was the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, which wanted and received oversight of the Hamas threat in Gaza, and they failed to properly detect and assess the October 7 onslaught in time. Much of this was due to the flawed notion shared by many in the military and political echelons that Hamas was deterred from launching a major attack on Israel. Of course, future inquiries may adjust this narrative, but this is the general picture that has emerged so far.

The surprise invasion on October 7 left the IDF facing a uniquely complex battlefield of asymmetrical urban warfare in Gaza that the generals felt called for a deliberately slow approach. This was most notably due to the extensive network of 500 kilometers of Hamas terror tunnels and the possible presence of live Israeli hostages around every corner. Various reports indicated the IDF was intentionally moving slower in Gaza than the political leadership was demanding.

Nevertheless, the IDF did create enough military pressure on Hamas to force them to give up hostages in stages. But eventually, Israel ran into the law of diminishing returns. For instance, with only 20 live Israeli hostages left in Gaza, there very likely could have been a higher number IDF soldiers killed while trying to free them. Similarly, trying to finish off the last 15-20% of the Hamas military units in Gaza had to be weighed against the long-term damage being done to Israel’s image globally. Most Israelis were well aware of these difficult calculations, and polls consistently showed their top war aim was getting the remaining hostages back alive.

In that context, Trump’s plan gave Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu an exit ramp from this painful, prolonged conflict that was hard for him to refuse! He could get back all the live hostages basically on day one. This was a major concession by Hamas, after they had insisted for months on a full IDF withdrawal from Gaza and US guarantees that the war was over before ever releasing the remaining hostages.

It proved vitally important that Netanyahu was able to make some key last-minute changes to the Trump plan for Gaza which made it more palatable for his Israeli cabinet.

At the same time, Trump’s envoys somehow convinced the Arab/Muslim states that the only way to end the suffering in Gaza was to put their thumb down hard on Hamas. Otherwise, Hamas was clearly willing to fight on to the very last Gazan.

Rebuilding Gaza in Stages
The Trump plan contains several phases, and it is important to note, even now, that Israel and Hamas have only officially agreed to phase one. This first stage calls for the return of all Israeli hostages – both living and dead – in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and dead fighters, plus an IDF pullback to the agreed “Yellow Line” in Gaza, and an increase in food and humanitarian aid. Phase one was supposed to be carried out in just a few days, but Hamas has strung it out over several weeks now with the slow return of bodies. Still, we are now down to six remaining bodies and phase two is looming.

Phase two entails the formation and deployment of an International Stabilization Force, led by Egypt and other Arab or Muslim troops acceptable to Israel (e.g., Indonesia, Azerbaijan), which would help police Gaza and oversee the disarming of Hamas. Hamas must give up its weapons and hand over control of Gaza to a provisional government of Palestinian technocrats, overseen by a global “Board of Peace”. Currently, these steps are all still at the embryonic stages, with the US pushing for a United Nations Security Council resolution to give the stabilization force a stamp of international approval (This is not such a popular idea in Israel, and rightly so given the inherent anti-Israel bias in most UN organs).

If all that can be accomplished, phase three would involve the infusion of (Arab oil) capital, resources, machinery and manpower to rebuild Gaza, which would be demilitarized to ensure a peaceful future alongside Israel. The Palestinian Authority would only assume a lead role in governing Gaza once it completes “reforms” demanded by the US. We have seen this game before during the failed Oslo process, but there is no guarantee in Trump’s current plan that the PA will return to ruling Gaza, as the Arab side had demanded. Further, there is no guarantee for a Palestinian state, only a provision that the circumstances “may” develop to consider Palestinian statehood in future.

With all this as background, it is time to answer the key questions about the Trump plan for Gaza

Is the War Really Over? And How Solid is Ceasefire?
My sense is that the two-year war on seven fronts has come to an end, with major achievements for Israel. But the enemies of Israel have not given up and Israel needs to always keep up its guard. How long this pause in the decades-old conflict will last, no one knows. But the Trump administration, in particular, wants this ceasefire to work and therefore it is holding despite the occasional dust-up in Gaza.

The Trump team considers their 20-point Gaza plan, now endorsed worldwide, as the greatest foreign policy achievement of Trump’s second term in office so far. They also view it as a stepping stone to expanding the Abraham Accords, the still in-tact legacy of his first term. Thus, we have seen Trump himself come to the region on a victory lap, then came Vice President JD Vance, afterwards Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and most recently top Pentagon and intelligence officials – all signaling Trump’s determination to see the plan through.

Part of his motivation here is that Trump has promised his MAGA base that he will keep America out of “forever wars” in the Middle East. Ending the Gaza conflict and reviving the momentum of the Abraham Accords are a pathway to forging a regional alliance between Israel and the moderate Sunni Arab states to self-police and stabilize the region with America in the background.

The ceasefire is also proving stable because Netanyahu is giving it a chance to work as part of salvaging his legacy as Israel’s longest-serving leader. He also is aware that it will be harder for the IDF to mobilize enough willing reserves to resume the fight in Gaza now that the last living hostages have come out.

For its part, Hamas is certainly testing the limits of Israel’s patience with the slow return of Israel bodies and the occasional ambushes on IDF troops. But Hamas has lost its greatest leverage against Israel by giving up all the live hostages, and they know the IDF will be able to come at them a lot harder and faster now if the fighting does resume.

Thus, the current ceasefire is fairly solid, despite the sporadic clashes in Gaza. In fact, it could end up resembling the one-sided truce in Lebanon, where Israel is launching strikes every day to punish violations of the ceasefire, while Hizbullah is doing little to nothing in response.

Is the Trump Plan in Gaza Good for Israel?
Compared to where Israel was before the Trump plan, I would give this a qualified yes.

Netanyahu was able to modify the Trump plan last-minute to ensure that the extent of the IDF’s withdrawal beyond the new “Yellow Line” in Gaza will be equal to the degree in which Hamas disarms. Phase one has left Israel in control of 53% of Gaza, including control of the Rafah crossing and Philadelphi corridor to prevent Hamas from rearming. The IDF also has complete control or a close line-of-sight on the entirety of the Salah al-Din Highway – the main north-south artery in Gaza. Israel also maintains the agreement assures there will be no rebuilding yet in any Hamas-controlled areas of Gaza. In addition, Israel has to approve what countries contribute troops to the International Stabilization Force in Gaza. All these terms are very advantageous to Israel and were accepted by the Arab parties when they endorsed Trump’s plan.

This is a remarkable achievement for Netanyahu, especially in light of the persistent Arab opposition to anything Israel was doing in Gaza over the past two years. Further, given that Hamas will likely find it most difficult and humiliating to give up their weapons, I suspect the Yellow Line may prove to be the new status quo in Gaza for several years to come.

This is already seen in how Hamas has been slow to turn over the last hostage bodies. Once the bodies are all back, they know this would mark the end of phase one and trigger the start of phase two, which requires Hamas to disarm and its terror tunnels to be destroyed! Hamas will assuredly cheat, delay, and try to survive and reassert control in Gaza. But if that happens, Israel has an agreement approved by the Arab states that gives legitimacy to the IDF’s continuing security presence inside Gaza.

The Regional Forecast
Going forward, the success of the Trump plan for rebuilding Gaza will be contingent on how strong the Arab/Muslim pressure remains on Hamas to disarm and hand over control of the Strip. Many of these moderate Sunni Arab rulers have a radical Islam problem within their own countries, and hopefully they will have the good sense to keep the thumb on Hamas.

Qatar remains a key player in this regard. They have been major sponsors of Hamas and only began to lean hard on the terror militia after they were hit by missiles from Iran and then the IDF strike against Hamas leaders in Doha. This all threatened to destabilize their own country, and they realized it was time to end the war in Gaza. And since the ceasefire came into place, twice now Qatari leaders have criticized violations of the truce by the “Palestinian side”.

This stands in contrast to Turkey, where President Recip Tayyip Erdoğan continues to be the most strident critic of Israel around. While President Trump appears to have a blind spot for Erdoğan, he and his party are unflinching members of the Muslim Brotherhood, and he seems to have a personal vendetta against Netanyahu. So, we can expect him to play a spoiler role in Gaza every chance he gets. Therefore, Israel must insist that no Turkish troops will be allowed in Gaza. That would especially make for a very complicated and delicate situation for NATO.

Meanwhile, the end of the Gaza war and the new US-led plan for its recovery have Israel left very dependent on President Trump. Many Israelis still worry that he could be tempted by wealthy Arab rulers to sell out Israel by forcing them to accept a Palestinian state. But Trump has an unmatched pro-Israel record so far. And in his recent Knesset speech, he first credited the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” for keeping Israel through this war. Then at the end, he candidly remarked: “I love Israel!” We must hope and pray that those warm sentiments towards Israel prevail over the next three years of his term in office. The next big test for Trump in this regard will come on November 18, when he is scheduled to host Mohammed bin Salman in the White House. He desperately wants the Saudi crown prince to sign on to the Abraham Accords and normalize relations with Israel. We will find out then just how serious are the Arab demands for a Palestinian state in the wake of the October 7 massacres.

Cover Photo Credits: Trump spoke at a speciall Knesset session the same day as the last living hostages returned from Gaza (Flash90)