The Recognition of the State of Palestine Is a Joke. So is Trump’s Peace Plan

Making good on his February 2025 promise of turning Gaza into the ‘Riviera of the Middle East’, real estate magnate-turned-US president Donald Trump unveiled his 20-point peace plan on September 30, 2025. Encompassing military, political and humanitarian aspects, Trump’s plan hinges entirely on Hamas’ total compliance. Described in one sentence, the plan seeks to bring to Gaza the same demilitarised status as West Bank, without the pretence of limited self-governance, which will be provided by an international consortium with chairman Trump at the helm. The plan makes no demands on Israel’s government, which is regarded as reactive (to Hamas’ terrorism), but reasonable.

The failure of the plan is written in its conception because it refuses to recognise that as more powerful of the two antagonists – Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and Hamas – conflict and peace depend entirely on the former. Moreover, Trump and his advisors, either seem to believe or deliberately want to project to their audience that Palestinians of Gaza are different from those in the West Bank. Hence, Israeli military provocations on one part should not affect the other part. When you choose to misdiagnose the problem, your solution can neither be honourable, nor sustainable.

While announcing his peace plan (with heart firmly set on the Nobel Peace candy), Trump drew upon the support of the Muslim world to add weight to his fantasies. The self-serving Arabs, opportunist Indians and forked-tongued Pakistanis complied, welcoming the plan. Clearly, everyone wants to assuage their guilt of complicity in the genocide in Gaza. Hence, any possibility of peace is welcome, even if it’s the peace of mass graveyards and silence of speared infants. But, with its newly acquired stature of being the leading Muslim power of the world, Pakistan realises that it must humour everyone, while furthering its national interests – a strategy mastered by General Pervez Musharraf during US’s Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. Hence, prime minister Shehbaz Sharif wholeheartedly welcomed Trump’s plan, but foreign minister Ishaq Dar made it clear that this was not the plan which Pakistan had proposed.

Meanwhile, Hamas has expressed its willingness to discuss the ceasefire as well as exchange of hostages and prisoners. Drawn from the people of Gaza, Hamas – whatever Israel or the US may call it – is mindful of the core that supports it and looks up to it. Even as Israel has been pummelling Gaza since October 7, 2023, political leadership of Hamas has engaged in peace talks with mediators like the US, Egypt and Qatar. One such negotiation led to the brief ceasefire in January 2025, which Israel continued to violate on some pretext or the other, with its military operations continuing in Gaza. The pretence of the ceasefire ended in a few weeks.

Hamas leadership was once again engaged in peace talks in Qatar in September when Israel used the opportunity to assassinate them by firing missiles into Doha. While the Hamas chief negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya survived, his son did not. Now he is going to Egypt to once again explore the possibility of cessation of Israeli military operations and relief for the people of Gaza, following Trump’s plan, despite the Doha experience. And true to form, even on the eve of the talks, scheduled for October 6, Israel killed over 16 Palestinian civilians in Gaza in its unceasing attacks.

An Israeli army flare drifts over buildings destroyed during Israeli ground and air operations in the northern Gaza Strip, as seen from southern Israel, Monday, Oct. 6, 2025. Photo: AP/PTI.

Why is Hamas repeatedly agreeing to negotiate peace with Israel despite the risk such talks pose to its leadership?

The answer is simple. Hamas is not a rogue terrorist organisation. It ran a democratically elected government in Gaza, and it believes that it will always have a political role to play there, no matter what Trump fantasises. The people of Gaza have also seen Hamas resisting Israel’s unilateral outrages, unlike the Palestinian Authority in West Bank, which, comprising a bunch of emasculated old people led by 90-year-old Mahmoud Abbas neither protect its territory, nor its people from Israel’s depredations.

According to a report issued by the United Nations, between June and September 2025 alone, Israeli parliament approved the building of ‘20,810 housing units in the occupied West Bank’. In the same period, 455 Palestinian structures (a quaint way to refer to tenements of the poor) were demolished in West Bank as they were deemed illegal by Israeli government. So, what exactly is the role of Abbas’ government is a mystery.

Another mystery is the belated recognition of the State of Palestine by several western governments. Where exactly does this state of Palestine exist? In the pockmarked West Bank where citizens of Israel operate with full impunity and Abbas only wrings his hands helplessly? Or in the battle-scorched Gaza, which Trump dreams of turning into a ‘deradicalised terror-free zone’?

Just as recognition of the state of Palestine is a joke, so is Trump’s peace plan. The truth is, there can be no two states in the territory formerly known as Palestine and now recognised as Israel. The Israeli regime, whether it’s the present or the ones before it, will never allow even a defanged Palestinian entity to exist. Any land recognised as Palestine is real estate for them to occupy for its population. And even if the notional state of Palestine was allowed to exist, it’s power differential vis a vis Israel will ensure that it is always vulnerable. Since neither accountability nor penalty is imposed upon Israel, it operates with brazen impunity and will continue to do so. Given this, even the so-called ‘independent,’ and ‘democratic’ Palestine will have no choice but to resist Israel’s actions through asymmetric means, which will be described as terrorism by the latter. Hamas or no Hamas, as long as Israeli impunity remains, resistance will continue in one form or the other. Security can be sustainable only if it is mutual. No force or technology can induce security if your neighbour remains insecure.

Hence, the only sustainable long-term solution is one secular, democratic, multiparty, federal state – something akin to the United States of Israel and Palestine. In this nation, the Palestinian political parties must be recognised and allowed to contest elections, just as Israeli parties do, both at the national as well as provincial levels. The way international community imposed restrictions on the South African apartheid regime, Israeli regime must be penalised for its treatment of Palestinian people. The world must stop arming Israel, until it recognises Palestinian citizens as equal.

The only good thing about Trump’s plan is the proposal for an ‘interfaith dialogue’ to ‘promote values of tolerance and peaceful co-existence.’ Radicalised Israelis need to undergo intense deradicalisation. They need to learn to treat all human beings as equal and differentiate between mythology and history. Along with the ceasefire, this should be the thing to focus on. Once this happens, Israelis and Palestinians should be encouraged to discuss their political future; if need be, under the benign gaze of chairman Trump. Who knows what comes out of it.

Sure, this is a fantasy. But it’s worth pursuing, because it is built on ideas of justice and equality. As Ahmed Faraz wrote, ‘Kahaniya hi sahi, sab mubalge hi sahi/ agar woh khwab hai, tabeer kar ke dekhtain hain (So what if it’s a fantasy, let’s work on it).'

Ghazala Wahab is the editor of FORCE magazine. She has written Born A Muslim: Some Truths About Islam in India (winner of Book of the Year Award, non-fiction, at the Tata Literature Live and Atta Galatta), edited The Peacemakers, and Dragon On Our Doorstep: Managing China Through Military Power (with Pravin Sawhney). Her new book The Hindi Heartland: A Study has just come out.

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