Oct 20, 2025
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Q. Why is the Gaza peace deal different from all previous Israel-Arab peace deals?
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A. The Gaza deal is not just different. It is existentially and substantially different. And not because it is already being breached violently or because its godfathers, Mssrs. Witkoff and Kushner, are coming to babysit it. That is all par for the peacemaking course between Israelis and Palestinians.
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Rather, remember when Israel made peace with Egypt, then Jordan, even the PLO, and when it entered into ‘normalization’ agreements with United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco? Both government signatories to these deals, the Israeli and the Arab, were publicly and openly committed. Begin and Sadat, Rabin and King Hussein, embraced the peace. Remarkably, all these agreements are still in effect, having outlasted endless challenges, some very violent. There is logic in their stability.
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In the current case, there is no peace treaty. Israel and the Palestinians--any Palestinians, whether Gaza-based Hamas or the West Bank-based PLO/PA--did not sit down face to face on the White House lawn as in 1993, sign and shake hands. The only Hamas leaders involved live far from Gaza. Neither the Netanyahu government nor the Gaza-based Hamas leadership is openly dedicated to or interested in making the Gaza deal work.
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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s five principles for ending the war--disarming Hamas, returning all hostages alive or dead, demilitarizing the Strip, retaining IDF control and installing a civil government that is neither Hamas nor the PLO--remain mostly on paper, unfulfilled. Conceivably, in the end this may turn out to be little more than a hostage/prisoner exchange and humanitarian aid deal.
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Yossi Alpher's Death Tango: Ariel Sharon, Yasser Arafat and Three Fateful Days in March
"Anyone seeking to understand how Israelis and Palestinians traded the hopes of Oslo for something approaching hopelessness is well-advised to read this book. With penetrating analysis and elegant prose, Yossi Alpher has told the gripping story of three days nearly two decades ago that continue to haunt would-be peacemakers. Yossi’s faithful readers will not be disappointed with his latest effort."
Ambassador Frederic C. Hof, Bard College
"A riveting account of the crucial days in March 2002 when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was profoundly changed for the worse. The peace camp has never recovered from those wrenching days, and we live now without any hope of a just settlement. Alpher is a highly respected expert who has spent decades studying this conflict from both sides."
Bruce Riedel, Director of the Brookings Intelligence Project
"A critical assessment of a key period in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict never before presented in such detail. The best and most capable players at the executive and political levels proved unable to forge any resolution, final or partial, because both parties continued to maintain an insurmountable gulf between themselves. This is a MUST read for anyone daring to tackle the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and of Israel-Arab relations in general."
Efraim Halevy, former Head of the Mossad (1998-2002)
Oraib Khader and Avi Bar-On are youngish Palestinian and Israeli bachelors with security experience, readiness to do business with one another, a shared fondness for women and money, and total cynicism about the lack of peace between their two peoples.
Oraib and Avi can never become true friends: the cultural and political gaps are too wide. But as they confront a failed peace process and a bleak peace future, they readily become business partners: shady business that exploits a lot of naïve international peace aspirations.
As Oraib sums up on a visit to Sarpsborg, Norway, where the ultimately-failed Oslo peace talks were held, “There is a lesson here for those who still doggedly and hopelessly pursue a two-state solution in the Middle East. Get smart. Get out of the Israeli-Palestinian peace business. Step back and let the Jews and Arabs screw one another while making money.”