A Middle East deal that all sides can celebrate, but will it lead to a lasting peace?
It is Donald Trump’s best moment of his second presidency and although this peace plan still remains vulnerable to future problems – this is the Middle East after all – the immediate benefits are indisputable.
For Israel, the promised release of the 20 living hostages and the remains of 28 others amounts to a revival of the nation’s soul and the end of two years of torture for the hostages, their loved one and for all Israelis.
Their imminent release paves the way for the war’s end by taking away the single biggest justification for Israel continuing to fight it.
For the people of Gaza this should be a moment of celebration after the hell of the past two years. Under this first phase of the deal, the bombing will finally cease and large supplies of aid – food, medicine and water – will flow into the enclave.
The key question now is whether the deal signed by Israel and Hamas will finally end this war, or merely pause it.
The so-called ‘first phase’ of deal does resolve the issue of the hostages but it still leaves many questions and disputes unresolved.
These include whether Israeli forces – once they retreat to the so-called ‘agreed’ line after the hostages are released – will continue to retreat further from Gaza.
Hamas wants all Israeli forces to leave the strip but it is highly unlikely that Israeli would also agree to leave the new buffer zones along the Gaza-Israel border, which are aimed at preventing a future October 7-style border incursion.
The other unresolved disagreement includes whether Hamas will agree to disarm as the Trump peace plan demands. Among the solutions informally floated are that Hamas hands back its larger weapons but keeps small arms. Part of the problem is that war-ravaged Hamas is probably not able to command all of its fighters to give back their guns, much less enforce such an order.
Floating above all this is the lack of clarity about what should replace Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the fear that Hamas wants to play a role in this.
Hamas has agreed to relinquish power in Gaza – at least in theory – and says it wants a technocratic group of Palestinians to initially rule the enclave.
But will Hamas agree to the peace plan’s proposal for foreigners like Tony Blair and Trump to have a key oversight role in this new body?
And which Arab countries will provide members for this new body and how quickly? And will Hamas be willing to not to play any part in this process?
These are all urgent unanswered questions that still need resolving in the short term. The longer-term questions of the reform of the corrupt Palestinian Authority and the realisation of a two-state solution are tomorrow’s problems at this moment.
So will this first phase of a ceasefire actually end this war? Hamas and Arab nations fear Israel may resume the war if agreement cannot be reached in the short term about the disarmament of Hamas or the governing body that will replace it.
But there are several reasons to hope this breakthrough over the hostages will permanently end this terrible war. Firstly, Trump, having invested so much in getting this deal signed, will not want to see his own peace process squandered by a resumption of fighting by Israel.
Trump can be expected to exert enormous pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from resuming his offensive in Gaza.
The hostage deal also makes it much harder for Netanyahu to argue a valid justification for resuming the war. The fact that Hamas held hostages gave Israel a valid reason to continue the fight no matter what the cost. But once the hostages are home, Netanyahu will struggle to argue for a new offensive in Gaza, given that Hamas is no longer a coherent military or political force, but rather a ragtag group of soldiers without a central command.
Gaza has been reduced largely to rubble and the strategic benefits of any renewed Israel offensive would be doubtful.
Polls suggest Israelis are desperate for the war to end, so it would be difficult for Netanyahu to persuade anyone beyond his right-wing allies in his government that renewed conflict is justified.
None of this guarantees that this peace deal will not stall or even collapse at some point. But the successful completion of this first phase in the coming week – with the release of the hostages and the resumption of large aid supplies into Gaza – makes it much harder for this war to resume again.
And that – along with the release of the hostages – is why this is such a huge moment in the Middle East.
Thailand launches air strikes against Cambodia
The hostage deal between Israel and Hamas is a stunning and historic diplomatic triumph that sets Gaza on a very rocky but achievable road map to peace.