Some meetings are convened to avert a disaster, others to divide the spoils. The recently-announced agreement in Gaza, backed by regional countries, and the recent White House meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump, were clearly the latter.

Only days prior, analysts asked: How to escape the morass? Would Trump lambast Netanyahu over the delays? Were there harsh dictates coming from Washington? Would the Israeli delegation arrive only to perform yet another round of diplomatic firefighting? The entire discussion centered on one anxiety: navigating the quagmire.

Yet when the Oval Office doors opened, it became clear the "quagmire" was no longer there. It had been left behind on the sands of Gaza. The men seated around the table were not firefighters rushing to extinguish a blaze, they were architects sketching a new map. This was no ordinary working session, it was a small, elegant Yalta Conference for the 21st century.

In February 1945, Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill met at a Black Sea resort not to discuss winning the war, the victory was already assured, but to partition Europe and structure the post-war world.

Similarly, the leaders in Washington did not meet to discuss defeating Hamas, the military…