SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
For the first time in a long time, the headlines out of Israel and Gaza are about the possibility of peace. That's because late yesterday President Trump announced that both Israel and Hamas had agreed to phase one of the framework of a peace deal. NPR's Daniel Estrin has been covering the war since the very beginning. He has covered the region for more than a decade. And I asked Daniel to join us to talk about this moment, the hope that comes with it, as well as the skepticism. Daniel, it has been a long week, a long 24 hours. Thank you for talking to us for a little bit.
DANIEL ESTRIN, BYLINE: Oh, it's great to talk to you, Scott.
DETROW: Let's start with that. What is the general feeling where you are? Is it more hope, or is it more skepticism?
ESTRIN: You know, everyone here has been conditioned to be skeptical for the last two years and two days, to be exact. We've seen ceasefire efforts fall through again and again. We've seen how Hamas has fought till the last man, no matter how many civilians were killed and how much Gaza was destroyed. We have seen Israel's leadership thwart ceasefire efforts repeatedly. We've seen how prolonged war has served Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's political survival. And yet it is incredible for me to say this, but for the first time, people here really are giving themselves permission to hope.
DETROW: Wow. Why do you think that is? What's different this time?
ESTRIN: President Trump has been the X factor, especially for Netanyahu. It was exactly one month ago when Hamas negotiators were sitting in Qatar meeting to consider a U.S. proposal for a ceasefire when Netanyahu ordered strikes to try to kill them. It failed, but it was a pivotal moment. Netanyahu came to the White House shortly after, and President Trump said, I have a peace plan I've worked out with Arab countries. They're on board. They're going to bring Hamas on board. You better be on board, too. What's different here is that the U.S. is guaranteeing that Israel will not resume the war once Hamas releases the hostages, and that guarantee is the key factor.
DETROW: And Daniel, is the reason that that guarantee carries weight - is that because Netanyahu has a better relationship with President Trump than he did President Biden? Is it because President Trump has been so aggressive about threatening, at times, Hamas, at times, Israel, saying stop this at else (ph), at a certain time, and people are, by and large, listening?
ESTRIN: I think it's because Netanyahu has no other ally today than President Trump. Trump was his last lifeline, and Trump was able to get Netanyahu to stop the Iran war. And now he has done the same with Gaza.
DETROW: This, of course, is not the first time a U.S. president has gotten deeply involved in negotiations, and this is not the first time that there has been a feeling of cautious optimism, right? President Clinton got very close a couple of times to a lasting deal. There were the Oslo Accords. Near the end of his second term, he brought Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak together in 2000 only to have things fall apart. How are you thinking right now about the durability and the future of this new peace plan?
ESTRIN: Well, President Trump talks about this being peace in the Middle East. We're not there yet. This is phase one of a deal to exchange hostages and prisoners. This is a deal for a partial Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. If you're thinking about peace in the Middle East, this is small potatoes. It is a huge breakthrough. Don't get me wrong. But the tricky part is the next stage of the deal, which is, will Hamas be disarmed? What kind of multinational peacekeeping force could be in Gaza? And then there are the very last points of President Trump's 20-point plan for the Middle East, which discuss, in these very vague terms, some kind of future pathway for Palestinian self-determination, for a Palestinian state, what successive U.S. presidents have tried to achieve. And one fundamental shift in this war is that Israel has never before spoken so openly against a Palestinian state as it has now.
DETROW: Yeah.
ESTRIN: And the Trump administration is avoiding more discussion of the topic. So this deal may lead down the road to diplomatic ties between Israel and other Arab countries. But if we've learned anything from the past two years and two days of war, it's that as long as the root issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are not addressed, most people here believe it's just a matter of time before the next round of violence.
DETROW: Let's pause for a moment, though, at this moment in time. And Daniel, tell me what, in your mind, has been lost on both sides over the past two years and two days, as you put it.
ESTRIN: I mean, what hasn't been lost? Palestinians in Gaza have lost nearly everything - their homes, their limbs, their schools, their lives. Israelis, as a collective, have fundamentally lost trust in their country's ability to keep them safe. Both peoples have experienced trauma that echo their worst chapters in history, whether that's the Nakba, the displacement of Palestinians in the founding war surrounding Israel's creation, or the Holocaust for Jews. This has bred resentment, revenge and generations on both sides that may not be hopeful that they can chart a better path forward.
DETROW: Yeah. You've covered just about every minute of this war. I still think about talking to you over the microphones in the very early hours of October 7, two years ago. What moments or stories that you've experienced are sticking in your mind today?
ESTRIN: I remember that. I spoke to you from the hospital in southern Israel...
DETROW: Yeah.
ESTRIN: ...Where I stumbled upon an old college professor of mine who split his time between the U.S. and Israel. And his daughter was killed in the Hamas attack on October 7. And I called him today, and I asked him how he's feeling in this moment. And he spoke about his children who lost their sister in the attack. He spoke about his grandchildren, his grandson who was there when his mother was killed. And this is what he told me.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: I think of my grandchildren. It doesn't end for them - my grandson, in particular, when his mother died literally on top of him and his father next to him with his arm blown off by a grenade. How does one exorcise that from one's memory? And at the same time, these kids went to a school for Arab and Jewish children so that they will learn to understand one another in mutual accommodation. Can they disassociate what happened to them directly on that terrible day from what is a deeply held value of the need for reconstructing relationships? I don't know, but it's going to color their life as long as they live.
ESTRIN: You know, Scott, I've heard voices also in Gaza echoing the same sentiment, that while they feel some sense of relief now, they've lost so much.
DETROW: Yeah.
ESTRIN: It's hard to really embrace a sense of happiness in this moment.
DETROW: And the way he just doesn't know how the future will play out, I think that's the case for so many people, whether it's the coming days of this deal or the coming years of living in that region.
ESTRIN: Yeah.
DETROW: NPR's Daniel Estrin, thank you for talking to us. Thank you for your coverage, and I hope you can get some sleep sometime soon.
ESTRIN: Thank you very much, Scott.
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