If there are winners in the temporary ceasefire agreement that came into effect between Israel and Hamas on Sunday, they appear to be President Trump and Hamas itself. President Trump was being cheered by children in Rafah as the ceasefire was announced, and Hamas, in the absence of a replacement governance structure or broader peace agreement, has stepped into the void and looks set to remain in power in the Gaza Strip for the foreseeable future.

Only an overarching and historic peace deal, which is within the grasp of President Trump, could salvage a positive outcome from the massive death and destruction and ensure that the current lull is transformed into an opportunity to avoid an even broader and bloodier conflict.

Surveying the aftermath

It is unlikely that anyone but Trump and Hamas benefits much from the ceasefire. The violent onslaught Israel has already ramped up in the West Bank indicates that the killing of Palestinians is not over; it has only shifted arenas. Meanwhile, the bell is tolling for the tattered remnants of the Oslo peace accords, as well as for the Palestinian Authority governing under their auspices from Ramallah. Israel has also announced that it has little intention of keeping up its side of the bargain in Gaza and does not intend for the ceasefire there to last beyond the first stage of 42 days, during which the majority of Israelis held by Hamas are expected to be released. So, even for the exhausted millions of civilians in Gaza, this is only a temporary respite from the bombs and guns. 

The ceasefire agreement led to many mixed emotions among Palestinians and Israelis. Relief that 2.2 million Palestinians can finally sleep safely and reasonably expect to be alive to see the next morning, at least for a little while. Rejoicing at the return of the first hostages and detainees on both sides (although Palestinians were forbidden by the Israeli authorities from public expressions of joy), with 90 Palestinians held by Israel were released in return for three Israelis held by Hamas. Disbelief and the yawning chasm of horror and sadness dawning on the faces of Gazans returning to the rubble of their towns and cities, who are just beginning to face the extent of death and loss stretching out before them as they collect the decomposed corpses of their loved ones from the shattered rubble that was once their homes. And a sense, amongst Palestinians, and indeed some Israelis, that Hamas has won. 

By signing an international accord guaranteed by major nations (the US, Qatar, and Egypt), Hamas has cemented both its existence and its leadership role in the future of the region.

Hamas, which launched the October 7 attacks on Israel and whom Prime Minister Netanyahu had sworn to eradicate from the face of the earth, has been de facto elevated to an equal status with the State of Israel. By signing an international accord guaranteed by major nations (the US, Qatar, and Egypt), it has cemented both its existence and its leadership role in the future of the region. As has been pointed out, the substance of this agreement is essentially the same Israel rejected in May of last year—many tens of thousands of lives and many tens of thousands of tons of bombs ago. It would seem that the pressure exerted on Israel by Steven Witkoff, President Trump’s Middle East envoy, finally led to the ceasefire President Biden’s team was unwilling to push for. 

Shifting the locus of violence

Any agreement that halts the senseless mass slaughter and destruction in Gaza can only be a good thing. But, as noted in an earlier piece, this could (and should) have been achieved without a ceasefire agreement. As it stands, a gradual return to the status quo ante October 7, 2023 (impossible, in fact, given the quasi-eradication of Gaza in the interim) does not resolve the pre-existing grounds for conflict: the continued occupation by Israel of what was and would and should, according to international law and most governments around the world, be the State of Palestine. It also sets the stage for what Israel has already begun, namely increasing military action against Palestinians in the West Bank, where the right-wing elements of Mr. Netanyahu’s government have openly announcedtheir plans for annexation.  

This will leave Hamas stronger. Already for the past week, the Israeli army has completely encircled cities, towns and villages across the West Bank and has launched a major assault on Jenin and its surroundings, killing at least 10 people thus far, where, until only days ago, the security forces of the Palestinian Authority had besieged resistance fighters. The Palestinian Authority (PA), on shaky legs and severely lacking legitimacy, now finds itself in the direct role of accomplice to Israeli aggression. 

As Israeli military action in the West Bank continues to expand, the only logical conclusion is that it will destroy—along with many lives, homes and vast amounts of infrastructure, no doubt—the Palestinian Authority itself, one of the last vestiges of the Oslo Peace Accords signed in 1993. Resistance to the Israeli army will be coupled and confused with resistance to any remaining PA forces who do not defect. Assuming that the Gaza ceasefire agreement is still gradually being implemented, Hamas will become, on the one hand, the only party on the Palestinian side that maintains the popular legitimacy of resistance against the occupation (and the mantle of leadership that accompanies the aura of victory), and on the other, that continues to keep some leverage over Israel by holding the hostages it has not yet released. 

A ceasefire agreement that allows Israel to turn its military and political sights on the West Bank will be no more than a temporary lull in what will become an even greater tragedy.

That is to say, leaving aside discussions about the destruction of Gaza, direly needed humanitarian aid, and the challenge of healing a profoundly traumatized population in the wake of what many have termed a genocide—a ceasefire agreement that allows Israel to turn its military and political sights on the West Bank, and which is not complemented by a comprehensive solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, will be no more than a temporary lull in what will become an even greater tragedy and an ever more blatant outrage to humanity’s shared mores and international legal and frameworks.  

An opportunity for peace

Of course, the most likely outcome is that Israel will also continue to violate the Gaza ceasefire—as it has been doing in Lebanon over the past month. Thus, conflict and violence will continue in Gaza, while it also escalates in the West Bank (including the torn and forlorn city of Jerusalem), which is currently enduring a daily nightmare of both intensive Israeli military assaults and settler rampages. 

The new US Administration faces a groundbreaking moment: will the deal-maker-in-chief take the visionary next step to achieve a historic peace in the Holy Land and, thereby, achieve enduring stability and security in the wider region and the world? Early moves indicate that he may be misled into pursuing the same path as the Biden administration. President Trump’s counter-productive executive orders lifting sanctions on violent settlers and lifting the pause on the transfer of 2000lb bombs to Israel and his suggestion over the weekend to transfer the millions of native Palestinians out of Gaza to neighbouring countries will quickly undermine the credibility and momentum he achieved with the ceasefire agreement.   

Should Trump find the political courage to stand up to the worst instincts of Israel’s extremist government and its backers, he would be putting America’s interests first and doing something no other US President has been able to do thus far. 

However, President Trump could be the game-changer. The US has tremendous might and leverage, but no president has used this to create change in the Middle East. Should he find the political courage to stand up to the worst instincts of Israel’s extremist government and its backers, he would be putting America’s interests first and doing something no other US President has been able to do thus far. 

The contours of a stable and equitable two-state solution—and indeed bold, creative and fair resolutions to its most thorny obstacles—that will allow both Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace in this land have long been clear. By using the US’s might, President Trump could forge this path and thereby create the context for both Palestinians and Israelis to live in freedom, safety and dignity. In that case, the Gaza ceasefire agreement, which he managed to obtain, would have been the necessary first step in an epochal outcome, and his achievement with the Abraham Accords would finally bear fruit. 

Failing that, however, his aura of victory will fade, and his presidency will be mired in the same weakness as President Biden’s—or worse—while regional conflict only continues to deepen and expand, sucking the US ever further into long-term regional conflict and instability with all the human and financial costs to the US this entails. In this context, whether Israel, Hamas, or any other entity “wins” is immaterial, as the people, both peoples, will have suffered and lost.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect an official position of the Wilson Center.