As high-level representatives to the Gaza peace negotiations sought the “yes” route at talks in Egypt on Wednesday, a key turning point came when the parties agreed to divide the nascent deal into two phases.
With the signatures of White House officials Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, a consensus has formed to separate the first phase of confidence-building from the rest of President Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan.
Part of this first phase has already begun – a ceasefire in Gaza and a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces – with the much-anticipated release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners expected by the end of this long US holiday weekend.
Why we wrote this
To obtain progress allowing a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of the hostages, the negotiators dissociated a first emotional phase of the Trump plan from a much more complex second. Much remains to be done to achieve peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
It was this division of the Gaza peace plan into two distinct phases that saved negotiations from getting bogged down in the details of the many complex issues to be addressed in a comprehensive agreement ending the war in Gaza, White House officials said Thursday in a briefing with reporters.
And it was the idea of a Phase 1 largely limited to the long-sought and highly emotional goals of a cease-fire and the release of all hostages that allowed Mr. Trump to take a victory lap on Wednesday and the streets of Israel and Gaza to flow with relief and jubilation.
“Too early to talk about peace”
Yet as welcome and hopeful as the agreed Phase 1 is, many experts warn that peace is not here yet.
“It is too early to talk about peace, and there are still important questions that will need to be resolved,” says Hugh Lovatt, senior policy fellow and Middle East analyst at the European Council on Foreign Relations in London.
Noting that there are potential obstacles in both phases of the deal’s implementation, Mr. Lovatt cites “the real risk that Israel will block its redeployment while continuing to undermine the diplomatic path to a two-state solution.”
Moreover, given the complexity of the issues that need to be addressed in the second phase of negotiations to achieve real peace, some experts question whether the major players – including the United States – will have the focus and stamina to win the final prize. They highlight Israel’s resistance, particularly to some of the yet-to-be-established principles outlined in the 20-point plan.
“There is still a long way to go to say that this tragic episode is truly closed,” said Stephen Walt, professor of international relations at the Harvard Kennedy School. “The question now is, do President Trump and his administration have the capacity to persist to achieve something beyond the first phase that actually resembles peace?
Progress on the ground
But in the meantime, the conclusion of phase 1 is already being felt on the ground. A ceasefire came into effect on Friday, shortly after the Israeli government approved the deal Thursday evening. As Israeli forces retreated from population centers to defensive positions on the outskirts of Gaza, thousands of displaced Palestinians began marching toward Gaza City and the northern part of the Strip.
It also marked the start of the release of Israeli hostages, which must take place within 72 hours of a ceasefire. It sparked an outpouring of joy across Israel, as Israelis anticipate the dramatic return Monday or perhaps even Sunday of their compatriots, who survived two years of horrific captivity.
President Trump, whose name appears at the top of the 20-point plan, is expected in the region on Monday morning: he will deliver a speech to the Israeli Knesset, then plans to meet the freed hostages or their families. Mr. Trump became the hero of the hostage families and the Israelis’ most popular political leader thanks to his ability to push for the release of hostages and a cease-fire.
He will then travel to Egypt for a formal signing of the agreement later on Monday. New on the agenda, according to officials: a summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, Monday evening or Tuesday morning. Its aim: to bring together regional and European leaders whose countries will bear much of the burden and costs of keeping the plan on track and ensuring the deal does not fizzle out after phase 1.
Despite Mr. Trump’s declaration this week that the Phase 1 deal represented the greatest day in history, the summit appeared, on the one hand, to recognize that there is still much work to be done.
But at the same time, the hastily arranged summit also reflects a leadership style on the part of President Trump that analysts attribute to launching the first phase.
“We saw in one week President Trump act like a powerful particle accelerator, forcing everyone to move at hypersonic speed to reach an agreement that most of us thought was unachievable,” says Nimrod Novik, an Israeli researcher at the Israel Policy Forum. The New York-based think tank promotes Israel’s long-term security through a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Disarmament and other obstacles
Even before the parties address the final issues of governing, rebuilding and securing Gaza through a ground force made up of third-country units, critical issues at the start of Phase 2 could still hamper any progress on the rest of the plan.
One example is the chicken-and-egg question: the disarmament of Hamas and Israel’s commitment to ending the conflict. Israel insists that Hamas must verifiably disarm and its fighters must be withdrawn from Gaza before it can fully withdraw from Gaza and make a ceasefire permanent. But Hamas first wants a guarantee that Israel will not take advantage of its disarmament to resume the war.
Once the challenges of phase 1 are resolved, “then the even harder work begins,” says Rachel Brandenburg, executive director of the Israel Policy Forum in Washington.
What security perimeter will Israel need, how humanitarian aid will be boosted and – item #19 of the 20-point plan – “What does a “credible path to Palestinian state” look like? she asks. “The 20 points of the plan are more like principles,” she says. “They are going to be difficult to understand in practice.”
Nonetheless, Mr. Novik notes that enormous work has been done over the two years of war, including by the Biden administration, to lay the foundations for a day-to-day plan for Gaza. It’s not a “fantasy country” to think that all the hard work put into formulating a variety of peace plans in Gaza should help pave the way forward and keep the peace process on track, he says.
“If all this [work] “If this comes to fruition, Israel will have less incentive to return to war,” Mr. Novik said, “and Hamas will have no choice but to accept.”
