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Why the Gaza ceasefire won’t lead to lasting peace

“A new Middle East” will require sacrifices that Israelis and Palestinians show no sign of making.

By MAX BOOT

Washington Post
October 13, 2025

Monday was a historic day in the Middle East: Hamas released its 20 living Israeli hostages only days after Israel stopped its offensive in the Gaza Strip. By brokering this agreement, President Donald Trump earned the rapturous reception he received in Israel’s parliament, with lawmakers chanting his name. Even prominent Democrats are giving Trump his due, and rightly so.

But is this really “the historic dawn of a new Middle East,” as Trump told the Knesset, with “a Holy Land that is finally at peace”? Or is it merely another ceasefire in the Arab-Jewish conflict that has now lasted more than 100 years? Unfortunately, all signs suggest there is nothing final about the peace Gaza is belatedly enjoying after two years of brutal fighting sparked by Hamas’s barbaric Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.