A year has passed since President Donald Trump made history by brokering a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, setting in motion an ambitious peace plan aimed at bringing lasting stability to the region.
In the days and months since the ceasefire and Trump’s 20-point peace plan took hold, progress has drawn support from across the globe — including from unexpected quarters.
Senior advisor to the Board of Peace Josh Gruenbaum told Fox News Digital that the success of the last 12 months was largely attributable to President Donald Trump’s leadership and commitment to seeking peace.
“The unlock was somebody who came in, who really knew the file because they had the chance to study it and understand it,” Gruenbaum said. Trump and his team, including U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, U.S. special envoy for Peace Jared Kushner and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, “created working relationships with regional actors with trust, overlaid with peace through strength,” while also forcing Hamas to finally understand that “this was either going to end the very hard way for them, or there was an off-ramp and a way to do this in a more dignified way, which is what the 20-point plan was.”
He said this has been achieved by “building consensus through the world, including through Europe, that this is the only game in town. This is the only pragmatic approach to make this thing stop.” A particular point of strength for the Board of Peace, Gruenbaum added, has been “cultivating really strong relationships with the United Nations.”
In November 2025, the United Nations endorsed the Board of Peace through Resolution 2803.
European Union Commissioner for the Mediterranean and for Demography Dubravka Šuica announced at a high-level briefing at the Board of Peace in September that the European Union had “gathered about $1 billion for early recovery in Gaza,” and would sign recovery projects with the UNDP and UNICEF. “We are doing this in alignment with the priorities of the Board of Peace and the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG),” Šuica stated.
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The International Stabilization Force, which will train a future police force in Gaza and oversee demilitarization, has received commitments from Kazakhstan, Morocco, Albania and Kosovo, with other countries said to be in the pipeline for admission.
Notably absent from Gaza’s future, per the Board of Peace plan, is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). The Board of Peace has been unequivocal that UNRWA will have no involvement in Gaza. One U.S. agency, the USAID Office of the Inspector General, is currently investigating over 1,500 UNRWA employees for involvement in terror groups.
On X, the Board of Peace recently stated that it “will only work with trusted partners who deliver for the people of Gaza and contribute to a deradicalized Strip,” and emphasized that “UNRWA fails on those litmus tests.”
The Board of Peace’s effort has support from unlikely corners. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrote in a June editorial in the Financial Times that while the plan was “not the one many of us would have drafted,” she believes “it remains the only framework backed by sufficient leverage, political engagement and potential resources to move parties towards implementation.”
The Board of Peace has received about $18 billion in pledges for reconstruction, the BBC recently reported. A Board of Peace official told Fox News Digital that next steps in the reconstruction program include a six-month program with 66 recovery initiatives, including rubble clearance, unexploded ordnance clearance, construction of temporary housing and destroying tunnel infrastructure. The initiatives are expected to cost $2.45 billion, and tenders for some projects have been submitted.
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In the year ahead, the Board of Peace must clear a number of hurdles, including a full demilitarization and de-radicalization of Hamas in Gaza. Gruenbaum says that the Board of Peace is “realistic and sober” but is also “in a historic place with Hamas,” having secured verbal agreements and offering a path to amnesty for those who qualify.
Gruenbaum also says that the 20-point plan is Hamas’ best path forward and that regional dynamics leave them with few remaining options. Mediators are increasingly supporting the Board of Peace, Tehran is focused on its current war, and Israel is continuing to apply pressure, though Gruenbaum says the Board of Peace continues to stress that they must comply with the ceasefire.
Gruenbaum said that deradicalization will never be a top-down process led by the U.S., but will be managed through the NCAG. He said that the NCAG’s members “have kids that have been brought up” under the current UNRWA-run system, so “they understand the situation.” The approach will involve the new technocratic government, whose members have extensive experience in civil service, taking the lead on “vetting teachers” and “vetting people who are involved in civil governance.”
Gruenbaum celebrated the potential of bringing together the NCAG and Israeli authorities through the transformation of Gaza. “This is a monumental opportunity for the Palestinian people of Gaza where their governing body is going to be uniquely focused on delivering services for its constituents and if we could create this amazing relationship where we build trust between Israel and the NCAG, we deliver on both sides of the equation – security for Israel and freedom and a better life, self-determination and prosperity-building inside of Gaza. That’s a two-way trust-building system.”
Gruenbaum added that the successes in Gaza could lead to successes elsewhere. “Maybe these best practices get learned by the Palestinian Authority. Maybe Israel starts adding more trust with different people in the system. I think this is a huge moment in the history of the Middle East.”
