Skip to main content

Israel, Hamas bide their time as Gaza peace plan stalls

As the Israel-Hamas ceasefire approaches the one-year mark in October, the Board of Peace is under pressure to deliver results in the Gaza Strip.

A boy walks carrying a table on his back past salvage workers scrapping the rubble of a building that was destroyed during Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza City on Aug. 16, 2026. — Photo by Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Images
A boy carrying a table on his back walks past salvage workers scrapping the rubble of a building that was destroyed during Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza City on Aug. 16, 2026. — Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Images

You're reading an excerpt from Al-Monitor Washington, where we break down the latest in US-Middle East diplomacy. To read the full newsletter, sign up here.  

WASHINGTON — Half a year into the Board of Peace’s mission, its top official for the Gaza Strip is tempering expectations. 

“Peace requires hard work,” the board’s High Representative for Gaza, Nickolay Mladenov, wrote on X Tuesday. “It is won slowly, through negotiations that run for months and rarely end exactly as anyone wanted.”

Mladenov’s message, which made no mention of Israel or Hamas, landed as the US-led body is under growing pressure to implement the next phase of the peace deal President Donald Trump unveiled last fall.

SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE

Continue reading this exclusive analysis

Original reporting and analysis unavailable elsewhere. Subscribe to AL-MONITOR to read this story and access everything we publish