A Time for War and a Time for Peace

The timing of the Gaza peace is telling. It is also damning to all the terrorist appeasers who prolonged the war by refusing to stand up to the evil of Hamas by standing behind Israel.

On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas unleashed a heinous terrorist attack on Israeli civilians that left 1,200 dead and saw 250 taken hostage. Throughout the remainder of the Biden administration’s time in office — just over fifteen months — war raged in Gaza and Israeli hostages remained in captivity.

On Oct. 13, 2025, Hamas released the last remaining Israeli hostages. When they did, President Trump had been in office less than nine months. (RELATED: Trump in Jerusalem)

The achievement of the hostage release and peace, even if it turns out to be temporary (as Hamas’s backsliding already forewarns it might), is an amazing achievement. It is worth remembering how it was achieved. And even more, how it was not. (RELATED: Trump Is the Colossus That Bestrides the World)

Peace was achieved because President Trump backed Israel resolutely. Absent this, Hamas would not have agreed to cease its carnage. It had become clear to Hamas that Israel was not going to stop its war against their terror. And Israel was not going to stop because it had the backing of its one indispensable ally (RELATED: Surprise! Hamas Has Already Doomed Peace)

Peace was not achieved by the appeasement of those states that succumbed to the travesty of recognizing a Palestinian state at a time when Gaza was ruled by a terrorist organization. It was not achieved by empty U.N. resolutions. It was not achieved by boycotts of Israel. It was not achieved by publicity stunt flotillas. It was not achieved by protests and encampments on America’s elite and effete college campuses. It was not achieved by antisemitic acts that posed as pro-Palestinianism. It was not achieved by petitions, speeches, and demonstrations. (RELATED: Real Peace in Israel Lies Beyond the Two-State Solution)

And it was most certainly not achieved through the feckless foreign policy of the previous administration. Instead, their weakness, which began in the humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan, began a show of weakness that included losing control of America’s own southern border. Their weakness was a signal to global aggressors — Russia, Iran, the terrorist organizations of the Middle East — that no price would be exacted for their belligerence. The Biden administration then compounded its signal of weakness by withholding, and threatening to withhold, weapons from Israel in its time of greatest need.

In short, all the world’s united gestures and ostracism of Israel proved to be less than meaningless when it came to achieving peace. All these did was prove to Israel that it could only count on Israel.

Of course, the world’s united gestures and ostracism proved something entirely different to Hamas. With each one, Hamas believed that if they waged their terror a little longer, perhaps the world’s concerted and growing pressure would break Israel’s resolve.

Hamas finally had to concede to peace because it saw its allies devastated one by one. Hamas saw Assad fall in Syria and that country’s refuge for terrorism end. Hamas saw Hezbollah utterly decimated. Hamas saw the Houthis attacked repeatedly. Hamas saw Iran, their ultimate patron, attacked repeatedly and successfully by Israel and the U.S. Hamas saw Russia stand aside as one after another of its clients were hit. Hamas saw China’s inability to project its power in the Middle East.

Hamas conceded because they saw most of the Middle East aligned, not with them, but against them. Hamas saw a greater Middle East desire for peace — peace with Israel — than has perhaps ever existed in the Middle East. And Hamas saw this unprecedented opportunity for Middle East peace, because they horrendously miscalculated on Oct. 7, 2023.

Not only did they not see any other Muslim nation rally to their terror, but these nations became increasingly emboldened against Hamas as terror’s allies fell one by one. Tellingly, throughout the two-year terror campaign, Middle East nations refused to rally to Hamas’s cause … or lifted a finger to aid Hamas.

In about half the time, the Trump administration achieved what the Biden administration had prolonged. Make no mistake, had the Biden administration’s policy of making America Israel’s vacillating ally remained in place, there would not be peace in Gaza today.

In the Bible, Ecclesiastes 3:1 states that “for everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.… A time for war and a time for peace.” The time for peace came because the current administration gave Israel a time for war against terror. And it came because the Biden administration’s time finally ran out.

READ MORE from J.T. Young:

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J.T. Young is the author of the recent book, Unprecedented Assault: How Big Government Unleashed America’s Socialist Left, from RealClear Publishing, and has over three decades’ experience working in Congress, the Department of Treasury, the Office of Management and Budget, and representing a Fortune 20 company.