Trump’s Gaza Peace Plan is the Only Game in Town, but…

US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace and his 20-point Gaza peace plan are off to a rocky start. Israeli-Hamas differences over the sequencing of the group’s decommissioning of arms and Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza are the tip of the iceberg, with Israel yet to endorse Mr. Trump’s announcement that they had agreed to a phased implementation of his plan. The differences mask the seemingly unbridgeable gap between Israel and the Palestinians over the end goal of Gaza’s transition after almost three years of war between Israel, traumatised by Hamas’s brutal October 7, 2023, attack, and a Strip and Palestinian polity shattered by Israel’s devastating and ruthless response.