US Press
Trump team drafts postwar plan tying Gaza to Saudi normalization
US PressGraphic: Times of Palestine
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The Trump administration is drafting a postwar Middle East strategy built around containing Iran and expanding normalization between Israel and its neighbors, Axios reported, citing two US officials and two other sources familiar with the process.
The plan's three components, per Axios: a regional alignment of US allies to contain Iran with Washington as guarantor; closing out the regional fallout from the 7 October 2023 attacks by securing the next phase of Trump's Gaza plan, an Israel-Syria security agreement and full implementation of the Israel-Lebanon agreement; and expanding the Abraham Accords toward a Saudi-Israeli normalization deal.
Where Gaza sits in the plan#
Axios reported the Gaza plan's "next phase" as one of three fallout items the strategy groups alongside the Israel-Syria and Israel-Lebanon files — placing Gaza's unfinished second phase inside a broader regional-normalization push rather than treating it as a standalone file, according to the sources described.
What is still undecided#
Axios reported the strategy remains in early drafting, discussed so far in two meetings between Trump and senior advisers, with a source briefed on the process saying a full draft is still weeks away. No timeline, funding mechanism or Palestinian political track was described in the reporting as part of the plan's current scope.
