In the aftermath of a ceasefire deal between the terrorist organization Hamas and Israel, it turns out President-elect Donald Trump was the key force behind getting the deal done after over a year of war.
The deal went into effect Sunday morning with Hamas agreeing to release 33 Israeli hostages in return for other hostages held by Israel. Multiple deals have failed and the Biden administration has repeatedly failed to bring the war to any meaningful end.
However, with Trump set to be inaugurated as the 47th President of the United States, he fulfilled a promise to bring hostilities to a close before assuming office after Biden failed multiple times.
New York Times columnist David Brooks commented on Trump's role in getting a deal done saying, "I do think it was Donald Trump’s pressure that really sealed the deal, because Israel had to swallow a lot for this deal."
He continued explaining, "They’re trading away a few hostages, some of them dead, in exchange for terrorists, a lot of them. And so, Israel didn’t want to do that."
The devastating war between Israel and Hamas is over for the time being but it did cost Israel as they had to give up a substantial number of hostages to get their people back.
The war has been raging since the horrific October 7th, 2023, attack that saw hundreds of terrorists break into Israel leading to the massacre and rape of civilians. Israel hit Hamas with unflinching vengeance but the war dragged out far longer than expected with terrible losses on both sides.
According to figures from the Hamas-controlled Gazan health ministry, the death toll was at 46,913 as of Saturday before the ceasefire took effect.
The Gazan health ministry claimed that a further 110,750 people had been wounded. Of course, these figures are from Hamas which has waged a propaganda war against Israel so it can be assumed that those numbers are inflated.
Of course, it is still reasonable to assume that a portion of those deaths and wounded are accurate meaning that thousands have died since the war began.
While Israel's losses are far less than even the most conservative estimates of Hamas's losses, Israel has still suffered tremendously from this war. The damage to Israel's tourist industry and the financial costs have crippled the nation and they will need years to recoup their losses.
Trump has major plans for his 2nd term in the White House and achieving a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was on that list. Now Trump will be able to shift his focus to the war between Russia and Ukraine that Biden has been unable to end.
That conflict could be potentially more difficult to solve but Trump has made ambitious promises about quickly ending that war that has killed thousands and cost the U.S. billions in aid sent to Ukraine.
Should Trump manage to quickly end the war in Eastern Europe, it will be the ultimate humiliation for his predecessor who sat by while these wars raged and cost the lives of thousands.
