On Thursday, February 19, 2026, President Trump convened the Peace Council in Washington for a kickoff meeting of the twenty-point plan, identified as the Trump Plan. In his usual manner, President Trump lauded the council and praised some of its members and event participants, while also engaging in self-praise and making several exaggerated declarations about peace agreements he had achieved in remarkably short periods of time. He then addressed the Gaza Strip, stating that “the war is over, except for a few small flare-ups here and there.” The president also showered praise on his team overseeing the implementation of his plan and expressed confidence that Hamas would disarm, noting that Hamas had committed to doing so and that if it did not do so voluntarily and peacefully, it would be disarmed by force.
President Trump also referred to the future of the United Nations, promising that it still has important roles and days ahead as an organization promoting peace and security. However, by choosing to speak in the future tense and through implicit remarks about the role of the Peace Council in this context, while emphasizing the short timeframe and efficiency with which it would operate to establish peace in the Gaza Strip and, implicitly, beyond it, he effectively reflected the disdain he holds for the UN and its lack of effectiveness. In his statement, or vision, regarding the Peace Council’s role in assisting the UN in fulfilling its mission, one can discern his intention to position the Peace Council as a substitute for the UN.
Although President Trump, who pledged that the United States would contribute $10 billion to the Peace Council’s budget and the implementation of its plan, succeeded in rallying several world leaders to support the council and even join as members, committing to inject funds into its coffers, and despite declarations by five countries that pledged to send troops to the stabilization force (ISF), the emerging gap between the lofty declarations and the conceptual and practical vision on the one hand, and the reality in the Gaza Strip on the other, is nothing short of embarrassing, and from Israel’s perspective, also deeply concerning.
Israel’s Risks in the Emerging Situation
If President Trump and his team, like the council members, are unaware of the gap between a ceremonial and festive gathering in Washington and what is unfolding amid the rubble in the Gaza Strip, or if they are ignoring it, this constitutes a serious problem. If this gap is not closed, or at least narrowed, the residents of the Gaza Strip will sink into a prolonged reality of hardship under conditions of a devastated territory devoid of vitality and future prospects. Israel will face a complex security challenge that could escalate and spill over into other arenas, with particular emphasis on the West Bank. In addition, regional security stability may be undermined, accompanied by further and dangerous erosion in relations between Israel and Egypt and Jordan.
The essence of the gap between the vision, the festive atmosphere, and the lofty declarations, and the reality on the ground, stems from Hamas’s overt and declared refusal to disarm: Hamas is reneging on its commitments to dismantle its weapons, and the organization’s leaders are publicly pledging to continue holding arms and to persist in the armed struggle against Israel until the end of the occupation, without necessarily specifying which occupation they mean, that of the Gaza Strip or of the State of Israel as a whole. Is this a reference only to the occupation of 1967, or to the occupation of Palestine “from the river to the sea,” a return to 1948, and to the very establishment of the State of Israel and its right to exist? The statements of Hamas leaders reflect the ethos of armed resistance, which still stands as a firm pillar of the psychological infrastructure of the Palestinian collective, implying also a rejection of Israel’s right to exist within any borders.
Beyond this, Hamas is working vigorously to rebuild its military and governing capabilities, appointing governors, ministers, and other officials who, in its view, should be integrated into the new governing system to be operated by the technocratic government. Hamas is demanding the integration of 10,000 of its operatives into the new security frameworks that will be established and operated by the technocratic government, and has even imposed a veto on the very entry of Sami Nseiman, who is designated to serve as Minister of Public Security, into the Gaza Strip, effectively forcing him to operate from outside the territory. Moreover, the Hamas leadership is briefing and directing the entire professional bureaucratic apparatus it controls on how to act vis-à-vis the technocratic government and which rights to demand, all in order to ensure that all professional systems operated by the technocratic government remain loyal to Hamas and continue to obey it, thereby entrenching its influence.
Indeed, in the reality that is taking shape and solidifying with each passing day, Hamas is preparing the groundwork for the “day after,” creating mechanisms of influence over the functioning of the technocratic government. In practice, Hamas is refining the Hezbollah model familiar from Lebanon: a terrorist organization that dictates, by force, the agenda and the operational space of the civilian government. Given that Hamas controls all state mechanisms, and considering that the technocratic government will not be able to import teachers, engineers, doctors, and other necessary professionals from abroad, and will be forced to rely on the workforce available in the Gaza Strip, this workforce, operated by Hamas and identified with the organization, loyal to it or fearful of it, will continue to follow its authority even on the day when their salaries are paid by the technocratic government.
Who Would Agree to Fight Hamas?
As long as Hamas is not disarmed and ceases to be an effective and present governing entity in the Gaza Strip, the technocratic government has no real chance of establishing an alternative governance to Hamas or of creating the conditions necessary to begin the reconstruction process in the Strip. The same holds true for the stabilization force (ISF), which has yet to be established. Although five countries (Kosovo, Morocco, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, and Albania) have already announced their willingness to send troops to the task force, and Egypt and Jordan, as well as European countries such as Italy, have declared their readiness to train Palestinians designated to serve in the security mechanisms in the Gaza Strip, and even an online tender has already been published to recruit personnel for the new security forces, there is not a single military force that is both willing and capable of confronting Hamas, disarming it, and demilitarizing the Gaza Strip. Not a single country or government is willing to send its soldiers to fight Hamas. And since Hamas is neither willing nor intends to disarm voluntarily, or through cooperation with the twenty-point plan, this amounts to little more than an embarrassing charade.
The only chance to narrow the gap between the vision and the ceremonial declarations and the reality—the gap between the establishment and launch of the Peace Council and the beginning of a genuine process of reconstruction and change in the Gaza Strip—is the disarmament of Hamas as both a military and political force, and the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip. It would be preferable if President Trump could lead Turkey, Qatar, and Egypt to impose such a move on Hamas, but the likelihood of this is almost nonexistent. These three countries, and certainly Turkey and Qatar, have neither the will nor the interest to realize such an objective. The alternative option is to instruct the IDF to complete the mission that should have been concluded long ago and that was also defined as a war objective.
Under current conditions, this is an entirely feasible mission, both due to Hamas’s relative weakness compared to its position one or two years ago, and due to the fact that it no longer holds our hostages—which significantly constrained the IDF’s operational flexibility—and also because the IDF now has an orderly and detailed war plan to carry out the operation within a relatively short timeframe and with efficiency, based on accumulated experience and the quality of the intelligence at its disposal.
President Trump will only be able to agree to this decision after exhausting all other options and becoming convinced that there is no chance of implementing his plan—to achieve Hamas’s disarmament and the demilitarization of the Strip without the use of military force—and that only the IDF can carry out this task. The challenge facing the Israeli leadership is to clearly present the reality to President Trump and the American administration, to neutralize or reduce the influence of Turkey and Qatar on the president and his administration, and above all to convince the president and his administration that achieving Israel’s war objectives is also an American and regional interest, and that in order to realize them, the IDF must be allowed to complete the task.
