Israel has rejected a proposal from the Arab League under which Gaza would be rebuilt without its remaining population being displaced. (AP: Evan Vucci)
"But what other option is there?"
"Why don't the Arabs come up with a solution?"
This reaction — repeated especially often in the US media — to President Donald Trump's AI-washed and hummus-infused vision of Gaza-a-Lago, is one of the most frustrating for any long-term observer of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Arab League, a group of 22 nations, this week presented another option, formulated by Egypt and the internationally recognised Palestinian leadership in the West Bank.
Under its proposal, Gaza would be governed by a reformed Palestinian Authority and rebuilt in five years, at a cost of $85 billion, without the forced displacement of its nearly 2 million remaining residents.
The US almost immediately rejected it.
"The current proposal does not address the reality that Gaza is currently uninhabitable and residents cannot humanely live in a territory covered in debris and unexploded ordnance," US National Security spokesperson Brian Hughes said.
Israel has also rejected the Arab League plan, saying it was based on "outdated perspectives".
But there is — and has long been — a proposal to resolve the whole conflict in accordance with international law, to guarantee Israel's security and give it normal relations with all its Arab neighbours.
Arab neighbours of Israel and Palestinian territories. (ABC News)
The Arab Peace Initiative resurfaces
It's called the Arab Peace Initiative (API) and the Arab League offered it again in Cairo this week.
The plan — launched in 2002, re-endorsed in 2007 and again in 2017 — promises Israel full recognition, normalisation and, critically, security, if it ends its occupation of the Palestinian territories and Golan Heights and accepts the establishment of a Palestinian state.
In return, the Arab nations would promise to "consider the Arab-Israeli conflict ended and enter into a peace agreement with Israel, and provide security for all the states of the region", as well as "live in peace and good neighbourliness".
The API was initially supported by the US.
It was adopted as part of the so-called "roadmap" for peace put forward by the Middle East Quartet of the UN, European Union, US and Russia.
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Photo shows Benjamin Netanyahu stands in front of two Israeli flags.
It was revived by then-US secretary of state John Kerry as a basis for peace talks in 2013.
The offer also guarantees peace with the wider Muslim world.
Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi told a press conference on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly: "We're here — members of the Muslim-Arab committee, mandated by 57 Arab and Muslim countries — and I can tell you very unequivocally, all of us are willing to guarantee the security of Israel in the context of Israel ending the occupation and allowing for the emergence of a Palestinian state."
Mr Safadi blamed Israel for failing to accept Arab overtures and said its military campaigns in Gaza and Lebanon had destroyed any remaining goodwill in the Arab world.
"The amount of damage that this Israeli government has done — 30 years of efforts to convince people that peace is possible, this Israeli government killed it. The amount of dehumanisation, hatred, bitterness, will take generations to navigate through," he said.
"We have no partner for peace in Israel, there is a partner for peace in the Arab world, and that's why the international community needs to move."
Officials have met several times to discuss the Arab Peace Initiative. (Reuters: Mohamed Abd El Ghany)
Israel, Hamas rejected plan before
Israel, despite positive statements from former prime minister Shimon Peres, has generally shown little enthusiasm for the proposal and then-prime minister Ariel Sharon rejected it outright when it was first floated in 2002.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in 2016 that the proposal could not form the basis for new peace negotiations with the Palestinians.
There are more than 100 Israeli settlements throughout the Israeli-controlled Area C in the West Bank. Boundaries are based on data from the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. (ABC News: Lucy Sweeney)
Hamas has also previously rejected it, and a Hamas suicide bomber killed 30 people at a Passover dinner in Netanya the day the initiative was launched in Beirut in 2002.
There are many sticking points in the API for Israeli governments, particularly the demand for a "just solution" regarding Palestinian refugees in neighbouring countries.
"I'll never accept a solution that is based on their return to Israel, any number," then-prime minister Ehud Olmert said of the re-endorsed API in 2007.
Another obstacle is Israel's loss of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank as part of any withdrawal.
Mr Sharon, under pressure from the Bush administration to implement the "roadmap," implied that preventing these outcomes would be a key factor for his push to withdraw Israeli troops and Jewish settlers from Gaza in 2005, saying he was "preventing the entry of Palestinian refugees into Israel and the keeping of major Israeli population centres as part of the State of Israel".
Need for peace remains as ceasefire crumbles
The signing in 2020 of normalisation agreements between Israel and Sudan, Bahrain, Morocco and the United Arab Emirates, known as the Abraham Accords, was initially seen as proof that Israel could advance its interests in the region without making peace with the Palestinians.
Those deals were widely considered a major factor in Hamas' decision to change its strategy in Gaza and seek a major confrontation with Israel, which came in the October 7 attacks.
Now, in the wake of the Gaza war, public sentiment in the Abraham Accords countries is strongly against Israel and officials are reportedly uneasy about their continuation, particularly as Israeli promises not to proceed with the annexation of the West Bank appear to have been ignored.
As the ceasefire in Gaza comes apart, the region is again staring at the possibility of endless conflict related to Israel.
Gaza remains in tatters as the ceasefire comes apart. (Reuters: Mahmoud Al-Basos)
The Israeli government is still pushing the adoption of the Trump plan, saying Arab nations should "break free from past constraints".
But the need for peace hasn't changed, and the way forward could be a revived and renewed API.
"The assumption that the Arab Peace Initiative and its demands for normalisation with Israel have already become obsolete, and that peace with the Arab countries is no longer contingent on resolving the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, has proven incorrect," analysts from the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies wrote in 2024.
Many figures, Israeli and Arab, believe peace is ultimately the strongest guarantee of Israeli security.
The API urges "Israel to reconsider its policies and declare that a just peace is its strategic option as well".