Opinion | What the Cease-Fire Deal Really Means

With the long-sought cease-fire agreement now in place, both President Biden and President-elect Donald Trump can claim credit for the accomplishment, while Israel and Hamas ponder what precisely they have signed up for.

The agreement’s first phase calls for the release of 33 of the about 100 hostages still being held in Gaza, a six-week cease-fire, Israeli withdrawal from populated areas, the release of possibly hundreds of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, and a surge in humanitarian assistance into Gaza. Phase 2, to be negotiated during Phase 1, would involve the return of the remaining living hostages, withdrawal of all Israeli forces from Gaza and a permanent end to the fighting. The final phase would include the return of the remains of all other hostages and reconstruction of Gaza.

The agreement has been joyful news for some of the hostages and their families and the long-suffering people of Gaza. But the transition into the second phase of the plan is by no means certain, bringing into question whether the war will truly end. For Mr. Trump, who is already claiming the cease-fire as the first success of his presidency, the inconvenient reality is that he is now shackled with responsibility for the deal’s fate.

In the immediate term, Israel will celebrate the return of hostages, most believed to be alive, held in inhumane conditions for 15 months, and will worry about the fate of those who remain in captivity. Many Israelis will also lament the release of imprisoned Palestinians, at least some of whom very likely have Israeli blood on their hands, and wonder if they will return to the business of terrorism. Israeli politics will almost certainly become even more roiled and unstable, amid far-right threats to leave the governing coalition out of opposition to such a deal.

Hamas will benefit from a respite from the war that has severely depleted its ranks. If Palestinians are given a chance to rebuild their lives, Hamas may very well rebuild, too — reconstructing its army and armaments and recruiting fighters to replace the thousands Israel claims to have taken off the battlefield. As badly beaten as Hamas may be, it has survived Israel’s onslaught and will almost assuredly survive as an insurgency. Indeed, if nothing else, this agreement will expose the hollowness of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s putative vision of total victory over Hamas.

Gazans, for their part, face a staggering humanitarian catastrophe that has traumatized a generation. The Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health has said that more than 46,600 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war started, though it does not differentiate between combatants and civilians. The war has produced enormous hardship in the enclave: starvation, a severe lack of water and health care, and the destruction of vast areas of housing and infrastructure.

Mr. Biden can derive a measure of satisfaction that the cease-fire, which eluded him for so long, has finally arrived and that more hostages, including several Americans, will now be freed. But hovering over this 11th-hour achievement is the image of a president-elect who has positioned himself to take credit for the agreement. Mr. Trump’s bully pulpit threat of “all hell will break out” if an agreement had not been reached before he took office appears to have worked: His Middle East envoy reportedly pressed Mr. Netanyahu hard to reach a deal, and Mr. Netanyahu yielded.

To be fair, the degree of cooperation between the departing and incoming U.S. administrations on this issue has been extraordinary. Indeed, based on our collective half-century of government service, we know of no precedent of a president-elect and his still unofficial envoy playing such an intimate and visible role in a high-profile negotiation with the complete backing of the president in office.

It may well be that Mr. Netanyahu — eager to keep Mr. Trump in his court and determined to win support for a tougher Israeli policy against Iran’s nuclear program, among other issues — decided to give him a pre-inaugural win. He may have calculated that stiffing Mr. Trump would be much harder and more costly than his habit of ignoring the Biden administration.

The success of this agreement will depend on Mr. Trump’s policies as president. He now owns the process: the return of all the hostages, the release of more Palestinian prisoners and turning a six-week cease-fire into an end to the war. All of that will be challenging, and its failure or success will determine whether the agreement was simply a respite between rounds or an actual pathway to peace.

Sixteen days into the first phase, negotiations are supposed to begin on returning the remaining hostages and Israel is to withdraw from Gaza. It’s here that the endgames of Israel and Hamas may be mutually exclusive: Hamas will not give up the remaining hostages — its only card — without an Israeli commitment to end the war and leave Gaza. And Mr. Netanyahu, fearful of Hamas’s claiming victory and worried about his own political future, won’t agree to that unless some way can be found to create an international or regional security force with a proven capability of preventing Hamas from rearming. Even then any full Israeli withdrawal would need to be gradual and tied to the security force’s performance.

It is possible that after six weeks of calm and unfettered aid pouring into Gaza, both Israel and Hamas will find it too difficult or costly to return to the fight. But it’s hard to believe that Mr. Netanyahu will stop the war as long as Hamas remains an armed insurgency and a political force. As for Mr. Trump, he could well decide to walk away from the matter and blame Israel and Hamas for the failure. But if he is interested in an Israeli-Saudi normalization agreement and a Nobel Peace Prize — or even just a “day after” reset in Gaza — that will mean dealing with a messy set of issues, including an unreformed Palestinian Authority; security, governance and reconstruction in Gaza; and a two-state solution that would invariably bring him into conflict with Mr. Netanyahu and his right-wing government. Indeed, Saudi Arabia’s terms for normalization have hardened considerably, potentially requiring an Israeli commitment to Palestinian statehood and concrete, tangible steps in that direction.

Is this new deal then leading to a negotiator’s cul-de-sac, or can it provide a pathway forward for Israelis and Palestinians? Is there any hope of something better emerging from this war? The answer is “no” if the imagination of Mr. Trump and regional leaders is satisfied with conflict management.

Any possibility of a pathway that leads to lasting peace will depend on Israeli and Palestinian leaders who decide to be masters of their politics rather than prisoners of their ideologies, and who are willing and able to define a better future based on a vision of two states for two peoples. It will also depend on a determined, persistent, creative American president — working hand in hand with key Arab states and an international community — to help Israelis and Palestinians achieve that goal.

Aaron David Miller, a former State Department Middle East analyst and negotiator, is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the author of “The End of Greatness: Why America Can’t Have (and Doesn’t Want) Another Great President.” Daniel C. Kurtzer was U.S. ambassador to Egypt from 1997 to 2001 and ambassador to Israel from 2001 to 2005 and is a professor at Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs.

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