US President Donald Trump played a starring role in a summit in Egypt on October 13, where he signed the Gaza truce and boasted of ending 3,000 years of conflict in the region. Far from the walls of the Oval Office, which I have heard him repeat the same idea ever since, the reality on the ground in the Strip is that residents lack basic rights and needs, and that a ceasefire with a path to peace is highly unlikely, Kim Ghattas, an expert on the region, wrote in his article Financial Times About “the dissonance between what Trump thinks he is achieving” and reality.
The first phase of Trump’s road map is practically complete. Hamas returned almost all of its 48 living and dead hostages, and Israel responded in kind by returning the remains of 315 Palestinian prisoners as of Monday, of which only 91 could be identified because they were dismembered or decomposed. All this while major hostilities ceased and the Israeli authorities allowed a slight increase in the flow of humanitarian aid, although far from what the agreement required and absent the restrictions required by the International Court of Justice.
Now is the time to determine the future, as it is impossible to reconcile Israel – which aspires to maintain the occupation – and Hamas – which yearns to establish a Palestinian state. The second tranche of Trump’s proposal, which has not yet been agreed upon, brings together general principles that vaguely link the disarmament of the militia and progress in Israeli withdrawal to the deployment of an international force and the emergence of a governance model with foreign participation. But different things can go wrong.
The plan may be halted if the United States fails to recruit volunteer countries to join the international force. Since last Wednesday, the fifteen members of the UN Security Council have been negotiating a proposed American resolution that is expected to give the Internal Security Forces a mandate and mission.
The early stages of the ceasefire celebrated in Sharm el-Sheikh have left Gaza without massive bombings, but in a conflict – which Ghattas describes as a “controlled war”. It also left two million Palestinians inside the Yellow Line, a new wall that confines them to less than half the area of the Strip, which is often described as the most densely populated place on the planet.
On the other hand, to the east of this barrier, which will remain in place until progress is made in disarming Hamas, 53% of the Strip is a desert of rubble off-limits to Palestinians and guarded by Israeli soldiers. Shaina Lu, from the Norwegian Refugee Council, tells El Pais that one and a half million Gazans need help to get a roof over their heads.
Despite the truce, Israeli shrapnel killed at least 242 Palestinians, authorities in Gaza said Tuesday, and the Israeli military reported sporadic attacks carried out by Palestinian fighters. The Trump administration claims that skirmishes are expected, but its members do not take their eyes off their Israeli partner. Two of them — the special envoy to the region, Steve Witkoff, and Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner — are in Israel again as of Tuesday to keep the project on track.
The White House realizes that the truce faces obstacles that may sink it before it becomes permanent. Immediately, Hamas has yet to return the remains of the four deceased hostages – three Israelis and one Thai – while families of the prisoners are demanding that Israel abandon the ceasefire if any bodies are to be returned. In parallel, Kushner will intervene in negotiations to provide safe passage for 200 Hamas fighters trapped in the Israeli-controlled half of Gaza when Orit Struck, Israel’s settlements minister, requests that they not be allowed to escape.
Jump to the second stage
The candidate countries to join the Internal Security Forces are confident that a future decision – which the United States expects within weeks – will answer what Trump’s proposal leaves up in the air: Who will disarm Hamas? The Palestinian militia still has tens of thousands of fighters, many of whom are young and inexperienced who were recruited during the conflict.
“Where do the Internal Security Forces fall on the disarmament continuum? Isn’t that the crux of the issue?” asks David Schenker, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a first-term Trump adviser. He told the Israeli newspaper: “These countries do not want their citizens to be in danger or to be the ones to disarm Hamas.” Haaretz.
Although the resolution exempts Israeli security forces from confronting Hamas, disappointment in negotiations over handing over the militia’s arsenal would spark Israeli repression. Netanyahu remembers him at every opportunity, Trump does not rule out this scenario, and Kobi Michael, senior researcher at the Israel Institute for National Security Studies and the Misgav Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy, sees it as inevitable.
“Hamas will not disarm,” he told El Pais newspaper by phone. “Israel is giving the United States space to try peacefully. I wish them well. And when they come to the conclusion that there is no partner on the other side, I assume they will legitimize the use of Israeli force.”
The most likely scenario is a recession. “The Israeli army will remain deployed” in 53% of the enclave east of the Yellow Line, “which will be devoid of Palestinians,” and will wait for “the appropriate moment to resume the attack against Hamas.” Point 16 of the Trump plan allows Israel to remain in the Strip until “Gaza no longer poses a threat,” an interpretable element it uses in Lebanon to bomb it daily despite the truce.
Real estate projects
Another element that could deteriorate the path towards stability is the desire to divide the Palestinians – and even more – through real estate projects. US Vice President J.D. Vance and his advisor Kushner in October expected from Israel that reconstruction could begin immediately in the Israeli-controlled half of Gaza, while the other side was rebuffed. “The idea is to start rebuilding” in that area and “bring Gazans to live there and get good jobs, security and comfort,” Vance said.
The project, which may have occupied Vitkov and Kushner on Monday in Israel, is beginning to bear fruit. The United States plans to build homes for 25,000 people, which will serve as a testbed for so-called “secure alternative communities,” according to American media. Atlantic on monday. Israeli intelligence will veto residents based on their ties to Hamas using unknown criteria.
The idea reminds us of the Riviera project that Trump delivered in February. Point 10 of the plan calls for developing Gaza with experts who promoted “miracle cities,” and the proposed resolution submitted to the United Nations would give the peace council — which would oversee the governance of the Strip and which Trump would chair — reconstruction authority, according to Reuters, which viewed the text.
Tamir Hayman, the former head of Israeli military intelligence, sees the occupation as the same thing in a different package. “Every suspect who passes (to the other side) must be monitored 24 hours a day Checkpoints“, declares L New York Times. He added that Hamas will attempt to infiltrate and launch attacks from within as resistance to the occupation.
The secretary-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which the United States and Israel want to deny access to the Strip, demanded on Monday that the Yellow Line not become “greater fragmentation” in Gaza or further separate Gazans from those of the West Bank.
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