The Fate of Trump’s Plan to End the Gaza Conflict

At various junctures, Donald Trump has appeared to be a useful protector of Israeli security interests. For example, he recognized the existential threat that the Iranian ayatollahs and revolutionary guards, with their extreme Jihadist ideology, posed to Israel’s future. Accordingly, in 2020, Trump ordered the liquidation of Qassem Soleimani, the commander in Iran’s revolutionary guards who had masterminded and directed efforts to create a ring of fire around Israel by arming Iranian proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and the Gaza strip. And in 2025 Trump has supported Israel’s efforts to eliminate Hamas (with its dedication to destroying Israel) from the Gaza Strip launching ground for Hamas’ October 7, 2023, massacre.

Most recently, Donald Trump’s administration propounded a 20-point “comprehensive plan to end the Gaza conflict,” exerted considerable pressure both on Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu and on Hamas to accept the plan. Trump managed, on November 17, 2025, to get the UN Security Council to adopt Resolution 2803 endorsing the Trump plan. (hereinafter referred to as R. 2803).

There are indeed positive elements in the Trump plan. R. 2803 calls for a permanent ceasefire, for reconstruction of the devastated Gaza strip, and for demilitarization of Gaza including destruction of Hamas’ massive tunnel complex along with disarming Hamas. Day to day civil administration of Gaza would be placed in the hands of non-Hamas Palestinians via a “technocratic, apolitical committee” aided by a Palestinian police force. During the initial reconstruction period, governmental policy in Gaza would be overseen by a “Board of Peace” chaired by Donald Trump and including heads of state of moderate Arab countries like Egypt and Jordan. Ultimately, R. 2803 anticipates governance by a “reformed” Palestinian Authority supposedly creating “a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.”

R. 2803 purports to be a blueprint both for reconstruction of the Gaza strip and integration of Israel into the Middle East. The endorsement of R. 2803 not only by 13 U.N. Security Council members but by Arab League members Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the UAR is ostensibly a highly positive step toward expansion of the Abraham accords and Israel’s acceptance within the Middle East. Sadly, the Trump blueprint is not likely to be successfully implemented in the near future and both the Palestinian and Israeli sides will be losers.

The first stumbling block relates to demilitarization. The formulators and marketers of R. 2803 — Trump envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner — contended, following direct contacts with Hamas representatives, that Hamas would accept the basic framework of the Trump approach – including Hamas’ disarmament in Gaza. Yet Hamas leader in exile Khaled Mashaal has already rejected the notion that Gaza be demilitarized and that Hamas soldiers surrender weaponry. Hamas apparently hopes to exploit R. 2803 by using a temporary ceasefire to regroup, rearm, and continue its project of violently destroying Israel.

As to disarming of Hamas, R. 2803 does envision a temporary “International Stabilization Force” (ISF) operating under the auspices of the planned international Board of Peace and cooperating with a Palestinian police force, Egypt, and the IDF to maintain a stable security environment in Gaza. That secure environment is supposed to include adherence to a ceasefire, demilitarization, decommissioning of weaponry, and non-interference with humanitarian distributions. Azerbaijan, Italy, and Indonesia have been mentioned as candidates for contributing troops to the ISF, but ISF assemblage is still in progress. A critical problem is that even a fully constituted ISF will not likely serve as an engaged enforcer of the ceasefire and disarmament. Even the Arab countries likely to participate in the governing Board of Peace do not anticipate an engaged enforcement role for the ISF. King Abdullah II of Jordan, for instance, sees the ISF as a monitor of the ceasefire but not as an armed and engaged enforcer. In short, only the IDF will ultimately be capable of disarming a resistant Hamas.

This defect of R. 2803 — the continued presence in Gaza of armed Hamas fighters — has detrimental implications for both Palestinian residents of Gaza and for Israel. Because both the IDF and the Trump Board of Peace will be distracted and preoccupied by disarmament tasks, the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Gaza will be delayed and vast masses of displaced Gazan civilians will continue to suffer horrendous living conditions. The ceasefire will be disrupted and more IDF casualties will ensue as Israeli troops flush out the remaining Hamas small arms.

Even delayed implementation of R. 2803 would carry significant benefits for Israeli security interests. Hamas’ strength would be greatly reduced by destruction of its tunnel complex and removal of rockets and other heavy weaponry. And a Gaza rebuilt under international supervision would markedly disable Hamas’ current inter-connections with civil institutions like schools, mosques, and hospitals. ISF monitoring of conditions would help ensure that result even without ISF soldiers’ engagement with Hamas fighters.

At the same time, R. 2803, like all Trump-initiated arrangements, carries elements of “America First” policy – a goal of advancing US economic interests (often along with Trump family interests). In some measure, this fact has negative implications for Israel’s long-range security interests. Donald Trump’s zeal to court America’s newly declared ally Saudi Arabia and to promote American business will likely result in sale of the most highly sophisticated F-35 fighters to Saudi Arabia (and possibly Turkey). American weapons sale policy had previously included maintenance of a “qualitative edge” for Israeli armaments vis a vis its neighbors. Israel’s F-35’s provide such an edge. Loss of its F-35 monopoly in the Mideast is a high price for Israel’s long-term strategic interests to pay.

The security hazard to Israel would be diminished were Trump successful in his efforts to remake the Middle East, expand the Abraham accords, and secure Saudi Arabian normalization of relations with Israel. Unfortunately, because of Israel’s current subjection to an ultra-nationalist coalition aspiring to Israeli sovereignty over both the West Bank and Gaza, expansion of the Abraham accords and Arab acceptance of Israel will not be advancing in the near future.

Another deficit to Israel in Trump’s R. 2803 is the integral involvement of Qatar and Turkey in the process of demilitarizing and rebuilding Gaza. In the case of Qatar, both Witkoff and Trump have dealt with that country as hotel investors, i.e., in a role in which they have been courted, cultivated, and royally treated. Their resultant benevolent vision of Qatar is belied by reality. This is the same Qatar that is aligned with Iran and with the Muslim Brotherhood in promoting a radically jihadist and expansionist version of Islam that derogates all non-believers. It’s the same Qatar whose sheltering and funding of Jihadist terrorist organizations like Hamas prompted Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf nations to cut off diplomatic relations with Qatar for several years. Qatar also founded and funds Al Jazeera — the international media network that often serves as a Hamas propagandist via slanted anti-Israel reportage.

From Israel’s security perspective, the involvement of Turkey under Recep Erdogan in the Trump plan is also insidious. This is the same Erdogan who has labeled Israel a terrorist state, severed diplomatic relations with Israel, and initiated a severe trade cutback. Again, Qatari and Turkish involvement in the Board of Peace would be a dangerous element liable to facilitate Hamas’ re-control of the Gaza strip.

R. 2803 notes that the Trump plan offers “a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.” Some UN Security Council members argued that this formulation insufficiently promotes establishment of an independent Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank. Yet, to its credit, this deferral of the statehood notion is well grounded in reality. The Palestinian Authority, often cited as a prospective partner for negotiating a final resolution of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, has not yet taken any “reform” measures critical to assuring a genuine commitment to peaceful coexistence with Israel. The status of Palestinian civilian sentiment is also highly uncertain. A recent survey by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research indicated widespread disbelief that Hamas had committed atrocities on October 7, 2023, as well as substantial support for Hamas despite its repression and cruelty in the Gaza strip. Almost 50% of West Bank Palestinians and 30% of Gazans saw “armed struggle” as the correct path. Given these uncertainties, even left-leaning Israelis see an independent Palestinian state as a prospect demanding many years of mutual confidence building as a prerequisite. In the meantime, R. 2803 provides some measure of Palestinian “self-determination” to Gazans via the “technocratic” civilian committees charged with day to day administration.