I hope that if the first stage of this Gaza Strip ceasefire, hostage release and prisoner exchange comes off as planned in the next few days that President Donald Trump is showered with praise — for three reasons that could impact the future of both the Middle East and America.

Thomas L. Friedman

The New York Times

Opinion

First, because getting to this point really was hard. It took a geopolitical bank shot that had to bounce off — and simultaneously win the trust of — Israel, Hamas, Qatar, Turkey, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE before landing in Gaza. On the degree-of-difficulty scale, this was right up there.

Good for the president and his team for engineering it.

Second, this is just the first stage of a multistage plan. So if Trump owns this early par

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