In Cairo, after nights of tense bargaining, a ceasefire finally froze the guns over Gaza. Israeli troops began pulling back under the eyes of international peacekeepers, while convoys of aid rolled through shattered streets. Families who had already rehearsed grief were suddenly rehearsing reunions, as hostages and detainees crossed checkpoints that had once felt like walls between worlds. The war that defined a generation of headlines seemed, for a moment, to loosen its grip.

In Washington, the political shock was just as profound. Clinton and Schumer, long Trump’s fiercest critics, publicly credited him with brokering what many called a once‑in‑a‑century breakthrough. Allies abroad echoed them, praising his decisive push where diplomacy had repeatedly failed. Yet even as his poll numbers ticked upward and talk of legacies began, one truth lingered: this peace is fragile, conditional, and utterly dependent on whether exhausted enemies can resist returning to the only language they’ve ever truly shared—war.