Trump’s Gaza Gamble: A Ceasefire Without a Roadmap and No Clear Future for GITA

By Elijah J. Magnier – 26 October 2025

The guns may have fallen silent in Gaza, but peace has yet to find its owner. Under President Donald Trump’s much-heralded Twenty-Point Plan for Middle East Renewal, the first objective — the “cessation of hostilities” — has been forced and achieved. Yet the plan’s second clause and beyond, introducing the concept of a Gaza International Transitional Authority (GITA), remains a diplomatic riddle. No one — not Israel, not Hamas, not Egypt, not Qatar, and not even Washington — can say with precision who will actually govern and control the devastated enclave, or on whose behalf.

Even among Trump’s closest advisers, there is an unspoken recognition that the Israeli leadership is unlikely to honour the spirit of the agreement. Benjamin Netanyahu has a long record of accepting U.S.-brokered deals only to reinterpret or stall them once the headlines fade. Washington and its Arab partners are well aware that Israel will do its utmost to sabotage or obstruct or dilute the implementation of any arrangement that limits its military freedom or introduces an international framework for Gaza. This political reality explains why a coherent vision for what follows the war remains elusive — not because the ceasefire lacks signatures, but because it lacks trust and unify objective.

GITA, as outlined in the plan, was meant to embody post-war reconstruction and shared administration. Instead, it has become a symbol of confusion — a title in search of a policy, a diplomatic placeholder masking deep divisions. Behind the rhetoric of “renewal” and “transition,” there is no consensus on the fundamentals: who rules Gaza, who rebuilds it, who secures it, and, most crucially, who holds Israel accountable. Until those questions are answered, the war may have paused, but its logic still governs the peace.

A truce built on ambiguityWhen President Trump stood before cameras in Sharm al-Sheikh Egypt to announce his peace vision, he claimed to have achieved what no one else could “in 3000 years”: