US President Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan unfurled last week holds the centre stage in the world today. After nearly two years of genocidal war waged by Israel, the prospect of a truce has opened up, although the final picture is yet to emerge. Hopes of a settlement rose following Hamas’s conditional acceptance of Trump’s peace plan, which includes releasing all hostages and handing Gaza’s administration to a technocratic Palestinian body, and Israel’s readiness to implement its first phase.

The ceasefire proposal in essence is in the nature of an attempt to bring the two parties to the negotiating table in order to bring peace to a region long mired in a genocidal war by Israel. The two positive points in the plan are the prospects of a cessation to fighting and the resumption of aid to the embattled people of Gaza Strip.

According to the plan, the war would immediately end after the exchange of prisoners. Israeli forces are supposed to withdraw to the agreed-upon line to prepare for hostage release. During this time, all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal. Also, once all hostages are returned, Hamas members who commit to peaceful coexistence and to decommission their weapons will be given amnesty. Members of Hamas, who wish to leave Gaza, will be provided safe passage to receiving countries.

There would be no role for Hamas in the post-war administrative set-up in the occupied territory. Even the Palestinian Authority, which controls the occupied West Bank, has not been assigned any role in the post-war setup. According to the Trump plan, Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee under the supervision of a new international body, the ‘Board of Peace’, to be headed by Trump and others. That would practically give America virtual control of the occupied territory for an indefinite period.

Although Donald Trump claims that his Gaza plan will bring durable peace to the Middle East, some regional experts have expressed doubt whether the scheme will help achieve a just solution to the Arab-Israeli dispute. In their view the document, vague in parts, is one-sided which favours Israel and puts the onus for creating the conditions of peace on the Palestinian groups. No doubt, the ceasefire will bring to an end the ruthless killing and bombardment by the Israeli forces and allow humanitarian aid to go through. But the main question is whether the Trump plan can establish long-term peace in the region without formally recognising the right of the Palestinian people to an independent state.

Especially objectionable is the plan’s ‘Board of Peace’ which is to manage Gaza after the ceasefire. According to the plan, Trump and former British prime minister Tony Blair will oversee Gaza territory and guide the Palestinian people until they are fully prepared to rule themselves. Strangely enough, Hamas, which has been ordered to surrender its weapons, will have no future role in Gaza. There is also no mention in the Trump plan to hold Israel accountable for the genocide it has committed in Gaza. Further, there is no guarantee that Israel will stop building illegal settlements in the West Bank.

There is an element of duplicity  and double dealing about the whole scheme, especially the way it was negotiated and given shape. When Trump announced last week that he had finalized his Gaza peace plan after discussing it with eight leaders of the Muslim world, some of them latter including Qatar and Pakistan publicly announced that the plan as announced by Trump was not what was agreed to. It was also reported in the media that Qatar would ask the US that some sections of the original draft be restored. It later came out that the initially agreed draft was tampered with by Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, during the six hours he spent working out details with Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff.

In Pakistan, the reaction to the Trump plan has been negative at the popular level. It is seen as a document which protects Israel, paving the way for its recognition by the Muslim countries in the coming days. The plan ignores the basic principle that Palestine has been illegally occupied by the Zionist entity which has usurped the fundamental right of the Palestinian people to live in peace in their own land. There has also been talk of Pakistan, along with other states, deploying a ‘peacekeeping force’ in Gaza.

The most prudent way to go about the whole thing will be for the government to take the parliament into confidence so that no step is taken that goes against Pakistan’s principled and historical stand in support of the Palestinian people.