James discusses the prospects of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal on Radio Islam.
To listen to the Radio Islam podcast, go to https://jamesmdorsey.substack.com/p/the-middle-east-report-with-james
[Anchor]
James, a very good morning and welcome. It’s a pleasure to be with you. I look forward to our weekly conversations.
Me, too. It took barely 24 hours for US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal to fall apart at the edges, with Israel and Hamas leveling accusations of ceasefire violations at each other.
[James M. Dorsey] So what this shows is the deep level of distrust between Hamas and Israel, which of course is no surprise, and the fact that both Hamas and Israel are pursuing very different objectives and motives in agreeing to Trump’s proposal to end the Gaa war.
Essentially, the Israelis accuse Hamas of not releasing the bodies of the deceased prisoners deliberately, and not because of the practical difficulties involved. Even though the Israelis knew going into this that it would be difficult because of the level of destruction they caused on Gaza, it would be difficult to find all the remains of the dead prisoners under the rubble in Gaza.
Coupled with this is the fact that Israel has essentially only agreed to the first phase of the Trump proposal, i.e. a ceasefire that would allow for a prisoner exchange. Hamas holds prisoners for Palestinians incarcerated in Israel and Hamas sees this as an actual withdrawal from the Gaza Strip that the Israelis have not really committed to as such, and of course as a permanent end to the war. And you see this playing out on the ground in Gaza, with the Israelis still attacking targets and Hamas brutally trying to reassert its authority and control in the Gaza Strip.
[Anchor] Still, the hostage issue may turn out to be an easy gamble in retrospect, James.
[James M. Dorsey] Absolute. For all the complications we see in the prisoner exchange phase of the Trump plan, the rest is much more complicated and nothing is agreed upon.
In other words: who will govern Gaza? Will there be an international stabilization force? What will be its mandate and the rules for the deployment of that stabilization force?
What is the end goal here? Is that depopulation of Gaza? Is that an attempt to improve the economic and social conditions of Gazans, or is it a Palestinian state?
Trump may think this is all over. The fact is that nothing has been done and dusted, and these will be very complex negotiations, if they are negotiations at all.
[Anchor] Now the vagueness of the Trump proposal has shaped Palestinian, Arab and Islamic buy-in into a set of post-war principles and objectives, without conditions or mechanism for implementation. At the same time, it offers advocates of Palestinian national rights an opportunity to fill the vacuum.
[James M. Dorsey] Essentially what we have seen is that Arab and Islamic states have some influence, especially with Donald Trump. What we have also seen is that everyone, Arabs, Israelis, Palestinians, Muslims, have gotten behind this plan, not because they agree with all of its provisions or principles, but because Trump is the only game in town right now, and no one wants to get on the wrong side of Donald Trump for several reasons in themselves.
Now that is where the opportunity lies.
So if, for example, the Palestinians, the Arabs and the Muslims were to insist that for this to work, the United States and the Trump administration must commit to the creation of a Palestinian state, then the implementation of the proposal, and the proposal itself is enshrined in international law, for example by having the United Nations Security Council endorse it, must be steps in which the Palestinians, the Arabs and Muslims engage in this process shape, or at least sincerely try to shape, this process. shape the process they still have to go through.
These are steps they still have to take, or opportunities they must seize.
[Anchor] So James, the need for a proactive Palestinian, Arab and Islamic effort is compounded by the widely differing perceptions of what it would take to make Gaza a springboard for a potentially lasting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian issue. I
[James M. Dorsey] Indeed. So essentially you have two very fundamentally different concepts of what the end game is. The endgame for the Palestinians, for the Arab states, for Muslim-majority states is the establishment of an independent Palestinian state as the end of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For the Trump administration and for Israel, this is an economic approach.
In other words, just like we had with the deal of the century during the first Trump administration. When Trump left Sharm el-Sheikh this week, where he had this summit of European, Arab and Muslim leaders, and the Egyptian co-host, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the president of Egypt, talked about a Palestinian state, Trump said, we are talking about very different plans. My plan is the economic reconstruction of Gaza.
In other words: the approach of a real estate magnet. And that, if you wish, is the tension in which Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims could at least try to shape the process and use their influence.
[Anchor] Okay, James, as always, thank you so much for your time, and we look forward to talking to you next week. It’s always a pleasure. Thank you.
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