Source: Zman Yisrael (Israel Time)

By Pinhas Inbari

Jerusalem, August 8, 2026

The most important sentence in the Board of Peace roadmap — the one born of the Cairo contacts and published on July 31 — concerns Palestinian statehood:

“a credible political path that achieves self-determination and Statehood.”

Why does that matter? Because it is precisely Saudi Arabia’s formula. Riyadh set two conditions before joining the “day after” framework: that the war end and Israel withdraw from the Strip, and that a “credible and irreversible” path — in its own words — be opened toward Palestinian statehood. The language produced in Cairo reads as though it was drafted to please Riyadh, in order to widen the Abraham Accords.

And why precisely now? Because of Hormuz.

Saudi Arabia set two conditions before joining the “day after” framework: that the war end and Israel withdraw from the Strip, and that a “credible and irreversible” path be opened toward Palestinian statehood. The language produced in Cairo reads as though it was drafted to please Riyadh.

It Is All Hormuz

While Israel weighs these decisions through “Israeli” eyes — are they good or bad for Israel, or more precisely for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — for President Donald Trump every move in the Middle East is measured through the lens of Hormuz, the strait that has locked the United States into a war of attrition that is bleeding the Emirates as well. The need for an alternative to Hormuz — and to Bab el-Mandeb — is now plain to everyone, and there are two options: oil pipelines through Israel, or through Turkey.

Everyone wants to route them through Israel, except Israel. Not for lack of plans: Netanyahu himself once raised the vision of pipelines running from the Arabian Peninsula to Mediterranean ports. But Netanyahu has already made his choice — not an energy terminal for Europe, but a coalition with Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich. Saudi Arabia has read that choice, and there is no chance it will accept it. It has said so to Trump time and again.

The election on October 27 will determine whether Israel becomes Europe’s great energy terminal, or collapses into a dark and depressive ghetto, with a tangible danger to its very existence. And the country that would sweep up that status is Turkey — which Saudi Arabia does not want in the role, as a Muslim Brotherhood state allied with Qatar, and from which Europe does not want to buy energy. Because Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would be no different from the Iranians at Hormuz, or from Vladimir Putin, who shut off the gas during the Ukraine war.

The road to the great bypass runs through the Board of Peace for Gaza — and through Israel’s acceptance of the board’s statement, including the “Saudi” sentence.

Everyone wants to route gas pipelines through Israel, except Israel. Not for lack of plans: Netanyahu raised the vision of pipelines from the Arabian Peninsula to Mediterranean ports. But he has already made his choice — not an energy terminal for Europe, but a Ben Gvir–Smotrich coalition.

An Account Left Unsettled

The tension between Trump and Netanyahu stems from a mismatch of expectations. Trump wanted to enlist Netanyahu as a pillar of his global strategy; Netanyahu wanted to enlist Trump for his own tiny politics and for his release from his criminal trial.

Trump delivered his share: he pushed for a “pardon” that was never granted and promised to stand by him at the polls. In return he expected Netanyahu to buy into his regional vision — first and foremost the Sharm el-Sheikh summit, which Netanyahu did not attend at all. Netanyahu took the gifts and gave nothing in return. Now, with the urgent need for a solution to the Hormuz problem, Trump has no patience left for Bibi’s tricks.

Not only did Netanyahu fail to help, he tried to sabotage. The freshest example is Lebanon. In the middle of the contacts on ending the Iran war, when Trump wanted to accelerate the dialogue with Beirut and even raised with Netanyahu a withdrawal from the five points and from the Syrian Hermon, Israel bombed Beirut on an unprecedented scale — and not only in Dahiyeh. Trump was furious, spoke with Hezbollah, then with Netanyahu, and issued the big “don’t.”

The tension between Trump and Netanyahu stems from a mismatch of expectations. Trump wanted to enlist Netanyahu as a pillar of his global strategy; Netanyahu wanted to enlist Trump for his own small politics and for his release from his criminal trial.

Will Netanyahu Get a New “Don’t”?

Now the story repeats itself. The moment the Cairo understandings became known, the IDF opened a heavy bombardment of Gaza. Nickolay Mladenov, the Board of Peace’s high representative, condemned it with unusual sharpness — and this after intensive efforts by the board and by the mediators: Egypt, Turkey, Qatar and the United States. Then came the urgent meeting with Netanyahu, which the board hastened to describe as “constructive and detailed.”

After a single day of a pause in the bombing, Smotrich and Orit Struck issued their threats, and Netanyahu resumed the strikes.

The assessment is that Netanyahu will receive Trump’s “don’t.” The only question is how many pictures from Gaza it will take before Trump’s patience runs out — and how high the price of a barrel of oil will climb in the meantime.

And if the “don’t” arrives for Gaza, it is reasonable to assume that if Jewish terror in the West Bank continues — and it will continue — we will get a “don’t” for the West Bank as well. The broader meaning of the Cairo understandings is therefore the beginning of a solution imposed on Israel — in the West Bank and on the Temple Mount too. In any case, it is with certainty the internationalization of the conflict.

If the “don’t” arrives for Gaza, it is reasonable to assume that if Jewish terror in the West Bank continues — and it will — we will get a “don’t” for the West Bank as well. The broader meaning of the Cairo understandings is the beginning of a solution imposed on Israel — in the West Bank and on the Temple Mount too.

What will Netanyahu do? It all depends on the polls. If he goes with the flow, he can prove to Trump that only he is capable of leading moves the right would ordinarily reject — an expectation he has so far failed to meet. The second option is the reverse: that only he, the leader of the right-of-the-right, is capable of standing up to Trump and thwarting a Palestinian state that the left is prepared to concede.

And what, in any case, is left to concede?

And What About a Palestinian State?

Is a Palestinian state even a real option? Not really. Not from the standpoint of the Arab states, and not given the condition of the Palestinian Authority.

While Israel excluded itself from the talks, the Arab states excluded the Palestinian Authority — so that Netanyahu and Abu Mazen were both among the absentees. The Palestinians in Cairo were represented by Hamas, and those who actually entered the picture are Qatar and Turkey, which sit on the executive board for Gaza. Ankara and Doha are the official mediators in these talks.

Israel did impose a veto on Turkish and Qatari troops in the stabilization force — but around the table where matters are actually settled, that Israeli veto is not worth much. Khalil al-Hayya met this week with Turkish intelligence chief İbrahim Kalın, and it appears that Gaza’s future was decided there.

Israel did impose a veto on Turkish and Qatari troops in the stabilization force — but around the table where matters are actually settled, that veto is not worth much. Al-Hayya met this week with the Turkish intelligence chief, and it appears that Gaza’s future was decided there.

And while Israel worked hard to be excluded, Abu Mazen worked hard to be relevant: he set parliamentary elections for November 28, exactly one month after the Israeli election, and presidential elections for the first quarter of 2027, alongside a refreshing of Fatah’s face at the Eighth Congress. Both decisions have turned against him.

Fatah’s veterans have boycotted the movement’s institutions. Mahmoud al-Aloul of Nablus, who was Abu Mazen’s deputy in Fatah (as against Hussein al-Sheikh, his deputy in the PLO), and Jibril Rajoub, whose seat as secretary of the Central Committee has been left hanging in the air — both are absent from the meetings. Rajoub has raised the banner of revolt: presidential elections before parliamentary ones. In plain language, deposing Abu Mazen.

The veterans accuse Abu Mazen of pursuing one purpose in all these moves — to crown his son Yasser, who was elected to the Central Committee at the congress — and of being willing, for that purpose, to open the gates of the West Bank to Hamas. Both are absolute red lines: in the Hebrew phrase, matters of “let him be killed rather than transgress.”

To sum up: the Arab states are looking for stability, while Israel and the Palestinian Authority represent anarchy.