For whom peace calls One of the most resonant news of the beginning of 2025 was the achievement of a truce between two closed opponents - Israel and Hamas. The agreement was reached through the mediation of Qatar, although the architect of ending the conflict is the United States, represented by the outgoing and incoming administrations. Of significant interest are the elements of the agreement, which in a simplified form can be reduced to the concept: “de-occupation of Gaza by the Israelis in exchange for the release of hostages held by Hamas.”. At the same time, the truce format, as well as the readiness of both sides to firmly adhere to the agreements, do not look very convincing. The Israeli government has been able to radically weaken the Palestinian militants from Hamas, but the complete elimination of the terrorist threat is not in sight, although a large number of Israelis express satisfaction with the deal, considering it acceptable, the confrontation is likely to resume after the parties go through a period of resource recovery.
To some extent, the truce is historical, because it is the final foreign policy accord of Biden’s reign, and at the same time the launch of peace initiatives announced by Trump to resolve various wars of our time. The philosophy of the agreements points to the importance of the concept of a rules-based world order, in particular the resuscitation of the importance of humanitarian law. In addition, the idea that any confrontation is finite is true, along with the unattainability of 100% of the result by military means, even under conditions of colossal asymmetry.
Sprouts of normalization of the security situation in the Middle East do not yet mean the advent of an era of peace, but they create a precedent for intensifying the work of diplomats in other regions of the world. This moment especially concerns Russia, which is still continuing its mutually destructive aggression against Ukraine for the sake of dubious territorial “successes”. The invasion of a sovereign country only externally somehow cemented the Putin regime, and even then only situationally. Now the picture is woven from negativity, outweighing the strategy of pushing through the front.
In Moscow, the euphoria from Trump's victory in November 2024 has faded. He turned out to be not what Putin saw, but a less readable and predictable politician. What is Trump's irredentist rhetoric about the Panama Canal, Greenland, Canada worth?. A set of loud territorial attacks by the future owner of the White House is a mirror reflection of Putin’s policy of gathering the “Russian world” only in the form of a North American superpower. And even though this is a purely theoretical construction, it makes Putin understand that he has changed approaches to interpreting his criminal actions against neighboring countries, especially Ukraine.. It’s time for the Kremlin to abandon investments in war, because forceful forms of expansion are a poor tool for ensuring security.
Trump will try to force Russia to peace by putting increased sanctions pressure on the Russian energy sector. In the context of the current degradation of the economy, sharpened for war, the destruction of the oil and gas production sectors, the reduction of petroleum products production capacity, the loss of traditional transit routes, the curtailment of the activities of the “shadow fleet”, Russia will be faced with a dilemma: either continue to cut the branch on which it sits, or that’s all.
Even without the Ukrainian Armed Forces having permits to use long-range weapons from Western countries, Ukrainian long-range UAVs are already capable of hitting targets at a distance of 1,100 km. In 2024, drone strikes caused 12% of Russian oil refineries to go out of commission, cutting off Putin’s ability to make money from diesel exports. At the same time, the costs of war already consume 40% of budget expenditures!
In conditions of huge human losses and economic stagnation, Russia will not be able to maintain such weight for a long time. Therefore, the Kremlin is already thinking through scenarios for at least a freezing of the war. The history of the effectiveness of truces in the asymmetrical Middle East conflict will definitely play a role here, especially after Trump’s inauguration.