A camp for displaced people in Gaza City's Zeitoun neighborhood, Gaza, on January 14, 2026. JEHAD ALSHRAFI/AP
Three months after Donald Trump imposed a ceasefire in Gaza on October 10, 2025, the American president's "peace plan" for the enclave has remained largely undefined, as it is subject to his sporadic attention on the conflict. Fearing that the plan would succumb to inertia, the White House eventually announced on Wednesday, January 14, the start of the Trump plan's "second phase." Before any resumption of negotiations, this phase confirms the creation of a Palestinian national committee to administer Gaza, which is expected to eventually run the ruined enclave.
This body came as the result of an agreement between Palestinian factions, which was reached in Cairo on Wednesday. The Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas came to an agreement on a list of politically unaffiliated technocrats, which is due to be led by Ali Shaath, an engineer and the PA's former deputy minister of planning. A Gazan native, Shaath was chosen so as not to provoke anyone: neither Israel, which has long opposed any involvement of the PA in the enclave, nor Hamas, which has pledged that it would only turn over its weapons to a Palestinian government.
