The Middle East has long been riddled by instability. This makes getting a sense of the broader, long-term trends in the aftermath of the Gaza war particularly challenging.

The significance of Trump’s 20-point peace deal that has (hopefully) brought an end to the Gaza war cannot be overstated.

However, this deal – and what comes next – will not change the Middle East. Rather, the wars of the past two years merely consolidated trends that were already under way. They didn’t serve as a radical break from the past.

Before October 2023, Israel’s place in the region seemed to be improving, despite the formidable “axis of resistance” Iran and its allies had built to counter it.

On top of its earlier peace agreements with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994, Israel had normalised relations with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan under the Abraham Accords. It looked set to normalise relations with Saudi Arabia, too.

However, once Iran and Saudi Arabia reached a detente in their long-simmering rivalry in March 2023, the urgency of closer ties with Israel faded.

Then came October 7. One of Hamas’ apparent aims in launching the attack was to refocus the........

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