US President Donald Trump unveiled his much-anticipated 20-point plan to end the nearly two-year-old war in Gaza on Monday, standing in the White House ballroom alongside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who accepted it.
In Trump’s telling, the ambitious plan will not only end the Gaza war but terminate “for eternity” a conflict he said has been raging for 2,000 years.
The US and Israel have come to an agreement. According to the president, much of the Arab and Islamic world – including Qatar, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, and Indonesia – are on board as well.
But how about Hamas? The assumption is that Qatar, Turkey, and the other Arab and Islamic states can deliver Hamas. That is the proposition that will now be tested.
If they can’t – if Hamas rejects the plan, which essentially calls for its surrender by giving up its arms and any power of governance – then Trump said Israel will have his full backing to “finish the job.”
Still, going on the assumption that Trump would not have rolled out this proposal without assurances that Hamas could be pressured to accept, the plan checks most of the boxes Israel has insisted upon to end the war.
Hamas defeated? Check. Hamas disarmed? Check. Hamas no longer in charge of Gaza? Check.
So, what’s the problem? Alongside the victories for Israel, the plan also gestures toward longer-term political arrangements: some role for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza, and language that could be read as leaving the door ajar for Palestinian statehood.
Those provisions are anathema to Netanyahu’s coalition and deeply unpopular with much of the Israeli public. His argument Monday night was that they remain distant hypotheticals, while the gains of ending the war and freeing hostages are immediate and tangible.
What will happen soon, in fact, according to the plan, within 72 hours, is the release of all 20 live hostages and another 28 bodies. For that, Netanyahu appears willing to accept the bitter medicine of a pathway for the PA to reenter Gaza way down the road if it undergoes true reforms.
Immediately after the October 7 massacre, Netanyahu defined the war’s aims as the return of the hostages, destroying Hamas as a military and governing force, and ensuring that Gaza would not pose a threat to Israel in the future.
On paper, this plan achieves those goals
For Netanyahu, the decision is one of costs and benefits. Would saying no to this plan, and continuing the war in an attempt to completely destroy Hamas, be worth the price of antagonizing Trump, further isolating Israel internationally, and endangering both the hostages and the soldiers still fighting in Gaza?
Trump is not only Israel’s best friend in the world, but at this moment, to a large degree, he is its only one. Brushing him off is not an option.
As for Netanyahu’s political position, the real possibility exists that the concessions implied in the plan could bring down his government. But Netanyahu likely realizes that even if he refused Trump and rejected the deal, the government’s days would still be numbered as a result of the haredi-conscription issue.
If Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir take their parties out of the coalition, Netanyahu seems to have reasoned, it would not be the end of the world to head into new elections a couple of months earlier than planned.
Toward the end of his nearly 30-minute statement, Trump said this deal – which he stressed was much, much bigger than Gaza – would be Netanyahu’s “crowning achievement.” And Netanyahu, if elections are triggered as a result, will undoubtedly claim that it represents the fulfillment of what he set out to do: Return the hostages, dismantle Hamas, and change the face of the Middle East.
The way the plan was presented at the White House was not just as peace in Gaza, but as peace across the region.
For Trump, it is a chance to cast himself as the ultimate dealmaker. For Netanyahu, it is the closest thing to an exit ramp. And for Israel, it is a reminder that even victory depends on the choice its enemy is now called upon to make.