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Paul Vallely: Why Netanyahu capitulated to Trump and agreed to a ceasefire    

24 January 2025

The US President is thinking broadly about the Middle East, writes Paul Vallely

Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu meet at the Mar-a-Lago estate last July

WHY did Donald Trump, a known friend of Israel, force Benjamin Netanyahu into a deal with Hamas — a deal that the Israeli Prime Minister had been resisting for the past nine months? The final ceasefire agreement looks much the same as the one that Joe Biden put forward in May. What changed?

Mr Netanyahu’s objection to the deal was, all along, based on the fact that negotiating with Hamas was an implicit recognition of the authority of a terrorist group that he had sworn to wipe out entirely. That was a key aim of his murderous scorched-earth policy in Gaza, a policy whose full extent is becoming clear only as the shell-shocked residents return to their homes — two-thirds of which have been destroyed.

The Israeli leader was stalling Mr Biden in the hope that Mr Trump would become President. After all, the last Trump administration had been a great friend to Israel — moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, accepting Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and scuppering the US-Iranian nuclear deal that Israel saw as a serious security threat.

That impression seemed confirmed when, two weeks ago, Mr Trump declared that “If those hostages aren’t back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East.” Mr Netanyahu, like the rest of us, mistakenly assumed that that was a threat to Hamas. But, when Mr Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, flew into Tel Aviv, he carried a very different message. It wasn’t a warning to Hamas. It was a warning to Mr Netanyahu.

Mr Witkoff, who is Jewish, was there to play hardball. That became clear when he forced Mr Netanyahu to break the sabbath to meet him swiftly to close the deal. The ceasefire had to begin the day before Mr Trump became President again.

What Mr Netanyahu had forgotten was that the first Trump administration, in 2020, brokered the Abraham Accords, a regional peace framework that normalised relations between Israel and Arab states such as the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco. The accords fostered diplomatic relations and economic co-operation in the face of a common enemy: Iran.

All this suggests that President Trump has broader goals in the Middle East. His attitude to Israel seems more nuanced than might be supposed.

True, there are hardline Zionists in the Trump camp; his new ambassador to Israel has even said that being Palestinian is a made-up identity. And, on Monday, President Trump lifted the sanctions that Mr Biden had placed on the illegal Israeli settlers who are currently torching the homes of Palestinians on the West Bank. But President Trump wants to reduce American military expenditure in the region. He intends his transactional diplomacy also to embrace Saudi Arabia, whose strategic and economic significance make it a linchpin in reshaping the Middle East. Mr Trump previously signed a $110-billion arms deal with the Saudis.

That — and President Trump’s notorious unpredictability — are what suddenly made Mr Netanyahu so afraid of the new US President that he capitulated to the deal that Mr Biden had shaped but could never enforce. God willing, it may also mean that the ceasefire in Gaza is less fragile than many suppose.

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