The Trump administration’s Gaza Board of Peace (BoP) is an audacious answer to an old riddle: how to rebuild Gaza, disarm Hamas and support postwar governance without recreating the conditions that produced Oct. 7 and the war that followed. Since its rollout, the BoP has already begun to sprawl beyond Gaza into something closer to a Trump-branded conflict forum — a shift that sharpens both its promise and its risks.
On paper, the architecture is formidable. Chaired by President Donald Trump, the BoP brings together senior U.S. officials and international figures, with defined portfolios spanning security, reconstruction and finance. A former U.N. envoy is slated as high representative for Gaza, linking the board to a Palestinian technocratic administration (the NCAG) and to a security pillar led by an International Stabilization Force under U.S. command. The design reflects a hard-earned lesson: Gaza cannot be rebuilt by aid alone, nor governed indefinitely by Israel or the Palestinian Authority in its current form.
Any sustainable outcome requires money, credible security enforcement and a governing structure insulated — at least temporarily — from factional capture. Even the reported buy-in requirement, roughly $1 billion for privileged membership terms, is meant to separate symbolism from real responsibility. In theory, that kind of financial stake should create discipline and deterrence against freeloading or obstruction.
Israel’s worries don’t disappear just because the politics have shifted. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now accepted Trump’s invitation to join the board, easing earlier tensions about being sidelined. But participation does not resolve the underlying concern: the inclusion of Turkey and Qatar — countries Israel views as having enabled Hamas through political cover, permissive rhetoric or financing channels. For Jerusalem, the question is not bruised pride; it is control. Who sets the rules? Who polices violations? And who certifies that Hamas has actually been dismantled rather than rebranded?
Outside Israel, the critique runs the other way. A BoP that is heavily American, selectively international and openly transactional risks looking like a “mini-U.N.” without the U.N.’s legitimacy. Some European governments are wary, while many regional actors — Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, Turkey and Qatar — have signaled interest, underscoring that Gaza’s future will be negotiated mainly in the Middle East. Trump’s widening invitations fuel fears of mission creep. If the BoP cannot deliver early wins — electricity, water, policing — the vacuum will be filled by armed factions and smugglers.
So how could this work? By becoming less a stage and more a machine. That means transparent funding rules; independent auditing; procurement standards that prevent reconstruction from becoming patronage; and a security doctrine that treats disarmament as verifiable enforcement, not a slogan. Israel must have real visibility into border controls, weapons interdiction and clear triggers for sanctions. The NCAG must earn local legitimacy by delivering services, enforcing anti-corruption rules and protecting the professionals who will run schools, courts, utilities and clinics.
And how could it fail? Easily. Let rival powers use the BoP as a podium, and Gaza becomes a gray zone again — flush with cash, thin on accountability and fertile for militias. Rebuild without demilitarization and you invite another war; demilitarize without a credible governing alternative and you invite revolt. The Board of Peace is not doomed — but it is not self-executing. Its promise lies in disciplined governance and enforceable security, not in the grandeur of its name.
