Former Israeli negotiator talks about the next phase of the Gaza peace plan : NPR

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

We will now turn to someone who knows what needs to be done to try to restore peace to the Middle East. It’s Daniel Levy. He was an Israeli peace negotiator under Prime Ministers Ehud Barak and Yitzhak Rabin. He is now president of the United States/Middle East project. The non-profit policy institute based in New York and London claims to work towards a dignified Israeli-Palestinian peace. Daniel Levy, hello. Thank you for joining us once again.

DANIEL LEVY: It’s a pleasure to be with you, Michel.

MARTIN: How do you read the prime minister’s meeting with President Trump? Based on what you heard at the meeting, what are the prospects for this next phase of the Gaza peace agreement?

LEVY: Very thin, I’m afraid, Michel, because what we saw was yet again an American president, this time with a different level of loose relationship with the truth and a different level of emphasis, essentially giving the green light to an Israeli prime minister to define a so-called ceasefire as he sees it. So if more than 400 Palestinians are killed, we are told that it is a ceasefire. If there are military operations every day, almost 1,000 infractions on the Israeli side, we are told that it is fine. Aid that was guaranteed entry was not allowed in – only about a quarter of the trucks. It is still a desperate situation for the Palestinians. No intention on Israel’s part to withdraw from the more than 55% of Gaza still under direct Israeli re-occupation. These are all dark things. But the American president will tell us: hey, it’s a ceasefire. It’s peace after 3,000 years. And if there aren’t enough people calling their bluffs, then that’s where we’ll be stuck, and things will get worse, of course.

MARTIN: Well, you know, the Israeli defense minister recently said that Israel would never leave Gaza, but the peace plan says that Israel will not occupy Gaza. So how will this apparent contradiction be resolved?

LEVY: First, this is a very vaguely worded and – let’s be honest – incoherent so-called peace plan. This is neither a serious approach to conflict resolution nor a serious approach to holding parties to a document that actually contains ironclad commitments. But the way you solve this problem, as far as the Israeli government is concerned – and as you say, this is a government that has shown its commitment that there will never be a Palestinian state, nor Palestinian rights. To solve this problem, you tell Americans that this is how we define it. And either America says, wait a minute, no, this isn’t peace, you can’t do that, or it says yes, sir. And we have another president who is apparently ready to say yes, sir.

Even more terrifying, I think, was yesterday’s reference, once again, to Palestinians displaced from Gaza. He said half of them wanted to leave when asked a question. So you have an Israeli society and politics that has generated consent for genocide and is now being told: yes, you can carry out ethnic cleansing. This is an extremely dangerous harbinger of things to come.

MARTIN: I should note that human rights groups and experts commissioned by a United Nations agency have said that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide. Israel rejects this accusation and claims to have invaded Gaza to defend itself from the Hamas genocide. That said, your argument seems to be that the Netanyahu government and the Trump administration will rhetorically insist that the peace plan is in place and moving forward, even if it is not, while both sides stagnate. There are other actors there. Are there then other actors who would have an influence here?

LEVY: Crucial question, Michel, and I think that’s what hangs over it. Will the regional parties come together enough, will they muster enough will to challenge the US and Israeli administration? They do it rhetorically, but will they use their influence? Will the Europeans, who in another case denounce absurdities, do so here, or will they be happy to line up behind Trump? I fear it is the latter. There are elsewhere, in what we call the Global South, people who denounce this, who impose measures against Israel, but much will depend on these other actors. This is before even talking, Michel, about what is happening in the West Bank, where incessant Israeli destruction continues, and whether this meeting was indeed a green light for new military actions against Iran.

You also have your internal debate, not only in the United States, but also within the MAGA movement. And President Trump appears to have leaned heavily into the Israel First wing of this movement with what he said last night. We may have announcements that there is a Peace Council, that there is some sort of international governance, but I don’t think we will have a deterrent against Israel’s continued international violations of international law, continued war crimes, or protection of the Palestinians.

MARTIN: This is Daniel Levy. He is a former Israeli negotiator, now president of the United States/Middle East project. Mr Levy, thank you.

Copyright © 2025 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit the terms of use and permissions pages on our website at www.npr.org for more information.

The accuracy and availability of NPR transcripts may vary. The text of the transcript may be edited to correct errors or match updates to the audio. Audio on npr.org may be edited after its original broadcast or publication. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio recording.