The 20-point plan for Gaza by US President Donald Trump released an unusual wave of international enthusiasm this week. From French President Macron to Turkish President Erdogan and from EU council chairman Costa to the spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs: they all supported Trump. Important countries in the Middle East also said they supported the initiative. You rarely see so much global unity.
There were a number of reasons to stand around Trump. In theory, a peace plan bears the promise that the immense suffering in Gaza comes to an end. After two years of siege, 66,000 deaths, famine, the displacement of hundreds of thousands in a sealed and uninhabitable coastal strip for the first time is a small chance of the suffering of the suffering, ending the genocide.
Trump himself is an important reason for positive reactions. There is only one leader in the world who influences Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Until now, Trump gave the Israeli government carte blanche in Gaza and to attack enemies in the region.
Last week Trump seemed to push back for the first time. He forced Netanyahu to apologize in Doha for the bombing of a accommodation of Hamas leaders. Trump rejected annexation of the western Jordoever, with which Netanyahu’s coalition partners threatened. In negotiations with Netanyahu and in consultation with Arab countries, he sought a way to end the siege of Gaza.
Every initiative that tries to stop a genocide is worth studying. Can this plan live up to its promises? Or will it turn out on a license for Netanyahu to finish ‘the job’ if Hamas rejects the plan? Trump has already given him that license in the prospect in so many words. If Hamas torpedo the plan, Netanyahu can pull his hands off and say to the world: you see, Hamas wants no peace at all.
Trump’s 20-point plan is not a detailed peace plan. It is at best an attempt at Stakten-Fires, followed by a number of hard requirements for Hamas and soft obligations for Israel.
Viewed through the eyes of Palestinians, the plan is a dictation of a winner. The Palestinians were not yet allowed to talk about their future. Hamas has to release the twenty still living hostages and return the remains of a number of other hostages. Hamas has to disarm and should never play a role in Gaza again. The Palestinian Authority, the Palestinian administration on the West Bank, may only get a role in the long run and after reform. It is recognized that the Palestinians want their own state, but with such a vague formulation a two -state solution is still far away.
It could have been worse. Gaza is not annexed and Palestinians are allowed to stay in the area: the insane American plan to make Gaza one big resort for non-palestines is off the track. In exchange for the hostages, Palestinian prisoners are released and the UN coordinated help can return to Gaza on a large scale.
The daily management of the coastal strip must come into the hands of a Palestinian committee that comes under the supervision of an international body, the ‘Council of Peace’ led by Trump. The former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who is known in the Middle East as a war criminal through his role in the Iraq war, must also become a member of this Supervisory Board. An international force, to which the US and Arab countries will also contribute, must maintain peace and train a Palestinian police.
Israel is not called to account. Not for genocide. Not for violation of human rights. Not for using hunger as a weapon. That must be indigestible for Palestinians, as well as for anyone who still had a remaining belief in the idea that international law protects the weak. The plan raises many questions about the future of the Palestinians, but also about the future of the liberal world order in which rules and democratic values should be a guarantee against the random of the superpowers. International law offers a framework to test the behavior of Israel and Hamas. It is absent in the points plan. Trumps plan is a textbook example of the right of the strongest.
There are countless ways in which this plan can derail. Hamas can reject the proposal. Netanyahu and Hamas can also agree to the shape to sabotage the deal later. Implementation of the plan is complicated, expensive and a very long process. Will Trump manage to stay with the lesson for so long?
Israelis and Palestinians benefit from the end of violence, but neither Palestinians nor Israelis see much salvation in a two -state solution. Reconciliation, sustainable peace, is therefore still very far away.
The obstacles that need to be overcome are countless and it is therefore easy to take the plan cynically as an attempt by Trump to get a white foot in the region and at the Committee for the Nobel Prize. Trump indeed wants good relationships with the region – he concluded a treaty with Qatar that obliges the US to assist Doha if it is attacked. And he just doesn’t keep up with that Nobel Prize. But if this plan can be a prelude to a ceasefire, then that is a profit.
Trumps plan is not the last peace plan that will be written for the region. It is to be expected an illusion that with one vague plan a conflict that has been going on from the world for eighty years. The plan does not satisfy as a blueprint for a sustainable peace. It is not the road to reconciliation and justice. It may bring relief in the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
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