The sun sets over the battered Gaza Strip, seen from the Israeli border on Tuesday.JALAA MAREY/AFP/Getty Images

After joyous days of bombs no longer dropping, hostages returning and aid flowing, the difficult questions are beginning to cut through the fog of no-longer-war. How, at what is widely considered the lowest moment in Israeli and Palestinian politics and mutual relations, can any lasting peace be carved out of this ceasefire?

I cannot think of a single individual in the Middle East who embodies that question, and knows how to approach it, better than a defiantly cheerful Israeli man named Mohammad Darawshe.

Mr. Darawshe and his tightknit family, who have lived for centuries in the village of Iksal, near Nazareth, were devastated by the Hamas atrocities on Oct. 7, 2023. His cousin Awad Darawshe, 23, was the Israeli paramedic who was murdered by Hamas militants while trying to save the lives of concertgoers at the Nova music festival. Mohammed, who works for the kibbutz community that was ravaged by Hamas, was close with families of hostages.

Aid trucks arrive in Gaza after dispute over return of hostages’ bodies tests fragile ceasefire

But he was also deeply affected by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s two-year military campaign in

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