Whisper it, but the Arab world may be moving towards peace

Many saw the region's upheavals as efforts to reshape power dynamics, either to compel Israel into peace negotiations or to precipitate Israel's eventual collapse. Yet the Palestinian armed movement began in 1965, an era shaped by the Cold War. Waves of national liberation movements spread across Asia and Africa, spurred by the ideological fervour of the Cuban Revolution and the Vietnam War.

Confluence of factors

For Palestinian fighters, the Arab defeat of 1967 changed the equation. The armies of traditional Arab regimes had been comprehensively and swiftly defeated. Suddenly, they were no longer the answer to the Palestinian question. More recently, the parties to the armed resistance against Israel, loosely termed the 'Axis of Resistance,' led to disaster, from Gaza to Iran via Lebanon and Yemen.

Today, an uneasy and indistinguishable form of peace hangs over the Middle East, the contours of which remain vague. Yet in Syria and Lebanon, there are new leadership teams that have suggested, tentatively, that this is their preferred direction. After years of turmoil, is peace in the world's least peaceful region now all-but inevitable?

Events have exposed not only the fragility of the 'resistance' narrative and its practices, but also its transformation into a set of projects that perpetuated civil and sectarian wars, draining resources and crippling development. More importantly, events have underscored the urgent need for Arab states at odds with Israel to adopt what might be called a 'strategic pause' in military lexicon.

A victor's peace?

Relentless wars, invasions, assassinations, and destruction have left a deep impact. Some regional states now lack even the minimum level of national cohesion, while others, such as Syria, now feel completely vulnerability to Israel. In Iraq, the privileges enjoyed by the ruling cadre are now thought to be under threat.

The combination of loss or feared loss is pushing regional actors towards an ill-defined peace. Some wonder whether it will it be based on economic or developmental prospects, but there are still far more questions than answers. Asking those questions openly, one should also ask: who benefits? Will this peace raise the living standards of the region's populations, for instance, or just the bank balances of ruling elites?

While the details remain poorly understood, what is known is that rejecting this path means remaining trapped in perpetual internal strife and an endless war with Israel. Importantly, this move toward peace is not just a US–Israeli project, nor even the aspiration of certain Arabs eager to close the chapter on a drawn-out conflict that has brought only disappointment and extinguished dreams. Increasingly, Arab countries are moving in this direction, driven by forces rooted in their own political paralysis and structural dysfunction—realities now impossible to ignore.