When US President Donald Trump announced his multi-phase peace plan for Gaza last year, the global reaction was a mixture of relief and scepticism. The plan involved an Israeli withdrawal from parts of Gaza, the resumption of humanitarian aid to the besieged Palestinian enclave, the disarmament of Hamas and the creation of a technocratic administration with international oversight. After years of warfare, characterised primarily by Israeli bombardment that has killed more than 70,000 Palestinians, any moves towards an end to the fighting were welcome, but a new Gaza still felt like blue-sky thinking.
Some key parts of Mr Trump’s plan now appear to be moving at a clip. On Wednesday, the US Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, announced the launch of phase two, which establishes the new Palestinian administration, known as the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza. The committee’s 12 members were appointed this week at a meeting of Palestinian factions convened in Cairo.
In parallel, the international oversight body, the “Board of Peace”, seems to be coming together, too. A UK government source told The National on Wednesday that British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been extended an invitation to join and is poised to accept. Last week, Israel announced that the board will be led by Nickolay Mladenov, a veteran Bulgarian diplomat who currently heads the Anwar Gargash Diplomatic Academy in Abu Dhabi. The rumour mill is swirling on who else will serve on the board, and the US is expected to announce the full list at the World Economic Forum in Davos next week.
The Board of Peace will have its own oversight body, an “executive committee”, thought to include Mr Trump’s son-in-law and former adviser Jared Kushner, Mr Witkoff and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair. To ensure security, an International Stabilisation Force is being put together, which will include soldiers from Egypt, Jordan and other countries yet to be announced – though Bangladesh and Turkey are among the contenders.
The fact that these new institutions are coming together at all is a major accomplishment. For the past fortnight, between America’s removal of Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro and tough talk about taking over Greenland, Mr Trump has been decried in many western capitals as a saboteur of the international system. Today, he is “Mr Multilateral”, pushing forward with a multinational plan for Gaza with widespread backing – from Israel as well as several Muslim-majority countries – that many veteran diplomats working on this issue could only dream of.
But there is reason to retain some scepticism. Some of the grandest claims made in Mr Witkoff’s phase-two announcement are difficult to make sense of. “Importantly,” he wrote, “phase one delivered historic humanitarian aid [and] maintained the ceasefire.” In truth, Israel has continued its strict blockade on almost all aid into Gaza and has routinely violated the terms of the ceasefire. And Hamas is not only still armed, but also so confident of its role in Gaza’s future that it recently elected a new chief. Phase one appears far from complete.
And yet, that cannot be a reason to stop moving forward into phase two. It will be up to America to prove the doubters wrong by pressuring Israel to abide by its obligations and by taking Hamas’s problematic intransigence more seriously. Meanwhile, in the absence of aid and security, Gazans are suffering acutely. The longer that continues, the more unlikely any long-term progress becomes, however much it appears in the short term that things are moving along.
At the moment, the Gaza plan underway is the only viable one that can reduce violence and work toward peace for Palestinians and Israelis. Its success would be welcome.
