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US President Donald Trump has made his anger unmistakably clear. His blunt warning to Hamas — “We will find ourselves with no choice but to go in and kill them if the bloodshed continues” — came in response to what he called “field executions” of Palestinians accused of collaboration. These killings, which drew condemnation from both the Palestinian Authority and France, have become a flashpoint in the fragile peace process.
This was not simply another Trump outburst. The warning signals a calculated pressure campaign designed to prevent Hamas from consolidating power and control in Gaza. Trump aims to dismantle the group’s military infrastructure and diminish its authority, wary that it might create irreversible facts on the ground — even as its visible armed presence as a “police” force maintaining order appears to have tacit American acceptance.
Behind this lies a larger ambition: making Trump’s Gaza peace plan work. It represents Washington’s first genuine effort to end the war since October 2023, backed by regional heavyweights, including ��������, Egypt, and Turkiye. Notably, Iran has yet to actively sabotage the deal. Still, formidable obstacles remain, even as the initiative has carved out a pathway toward relative calm and extended ceasefire — always shadowed by the threat that Israel might resume military action on any number of pretexts.
Yet the picture is not entirely bleak. The plan has achieved meaningful progress: halting devastating military strikes on Palestinian civilians, initiating hostage and prisoner exchanges, and proposing phased Israeli withdrawal paired with internationally supervised security arrangements. It envisions a technocratic transitional government for Gaza funded by Arab and international donors, followed by massive reconstruction efforts reconnecting the enclave with the West Bank. If successful, this could usher in a prolonged period without active warfare. But there is a catch: donors need ironclad guarantees that Gaza will not be destroyed again. Without these, the estimated $70 billion needed for reconstruction — a decade-long undertaking under ideal conditions — will fail to materialize. Right now, only Trump can provide those assurances, leveraging both his pressure on Israel’s hard-line government and his personal rapport with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
None of this works, however, without a parallel political process leading toward a two-state solution — the outcome �������� champions, with backing from France and much of the international community. The steps outlined above may seem ambitious from Trump’s perspective, but they rest on precarious foundations where political commitments collide with Palestinians’ grinding daily hardships. Without genuine hope and recognition of their right to statehood, the cycle of violence will inevitably return. 

Washington now faces a delicate balancing act.

Hassan Al-Mustafa

That anxiety intensified after Trump’s address to the Israeli Knesset, where he delivered a rousing validation of Tel Aviv: “After so many years of unceasing war and endless danger, today the skies are calm, the guns are silent, the sirens are still, and the sun rises on a holy land that is finally at peace.”
Such soaring rhetoric risks inflating Netanyahu’s government with triumphalism and a sense of unchallenged dominance — hardly the mindset conducive to compromise during subsequent phases requiring gradual Gaza withdrawals, sustained humanitarian access, and complete military stand-down. Washington now faces a delicate balancing act between its strategic alliance with Israel and its relationships with Arab states, particularly after Arab leaders at the Sharm El-Sheikh Summit endorsed Trump’s approach and pledged commitment to “sustainable peace” through “gradual implementation.”
But sustainable peace demands something critically lacking: mutual trust. Genuine stability cannot take root in soil poisoned by suspicion, especially with the specter of renewed Israeli-Iranian conflict looming, and Israeli strikes in Syria and Lebanon stoking regional tensions.
Prince Turki Al-Faisal, ��������’s former ambassador to the US, has repeatedly cautioned against premature judgments about Trump’s plan, emphasizing that outcomes matter more than intentions. The coming weeks and months will prove decisive.
Arab and Islamic nations now shoulder enormous responsibility: converting the Sharm El-Sheikh Declaration from words into integrated action that weaves together security, reconstruction, political reform, emergency humanitarian relief, and institutional support for the Palestinian Authority. Success here would mark real advancement. But if Israel’s hard-line posture persists and Tel Aviv continues to rely on overwhelming force, this ceasefire will become merely another exercise in crisis management — not resolution. That path leads back to existential threats for Palestinians, risking renewed genocide and mass displacement, while robbing the Middle East of security and stability that everyone desperately needs.

• Hassan Al-Mustafa is a Saudi writer and researcher interested in Islamic movements, the development of religious discourse, and the relationship between Gulf Cooperation Council states and Iran.
X: @Halmustafa