As with all of US President Donald Trump’s announcements his claim a deal has been settled between Hamas and Israel is overblown and should be handled carefully.

He says his “Board of Peace” has scored an ‘historic’ deal in which Hamas will disarm and a new Palestinian government will take over. But for now there are too many unanswered questions. And insiders from both sides have made it clear that they are not happy with aspects of the so-called plan, which involves another roadmap, something happening in the future.

Within 14 days, with the caveat that there may be extensions, a plan for how to disarm will be presented to all parties after it has been approved. On a positive note Ghazi Hamad, part of Hamas’s team of negotiators said: “These negotiations were difficult and hard, and we tried to reach the best possible formula that was achievable.” But he stressed Hamas will not go along with any part of the agreement if Israeli forces failed on their obligations and nor would Hamas disarm before they have left Gaza. Disarmament also rests on there being progress in reconstructing the Strip.

Delve into the details of any Trump claim on the Middle East and it is possible to see how enormously complex it really is and how much can go wrong very quickly. Trump’s statement even confirms this. He said: “This agreement is a critical step towards Gaza finally being governed by a new Palestinian government that will work closely with the Board of Peace to help the Palestinian people.”

So whatever has been agreed is a “step,” a wish, a development and not a fact as in Israeli troops currently occupying 70% of Gaza are not leaving and as of today Hamas still holds its weapons. And you cannot talk about Gaza without mentioning Iran - even though Trump has managed to do exactly that.

The broad outline of the agreement is that there will be a “phased disarmament” involving Hamas and other militant factions surrendering their weapons to a Palestinian committee and the terror tunnels will be dismantled. The Israeli Defence Force will withdraw completely and there will be a transitional government, plus a new Palestinian police force.

Nobody has said who are the Palestinian technocrats who will eventually govern Gaza, how long this process will take. What happens to the police in Gaza, who are armed and who serve the Hamas government and Gazans but who are not technically fighters? Hamas police in Gaza several times during assignments to the Strip before this war all told me that in the event of conflict with Israel they would withdraw as they are not fighters. Members of the Hamas fighting force confirmed to me this was the case, although this was some time before this latest war. And what of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a smaller but potent force within Gaza?

Meanwhile just days ago Israel killed Gaza North’s police chief Brigadier-General Abdel-Nasser al-Maqadma, who also served as governor of northern Gaza. What of the more than 75,000 dead in Gaza, still more lying under the rubbled buildings in the hellscape that followed Hamas’s horrific October 7 attack on Israel in 2023. Approximately 1,200 died in the Hamas attacks, mainly civilians including children and roughly 251 people were abducted as hostages. The dead and living have been returned to Israel, including foreigners killed and abducted in the terror attack. All of this has led to enormous mistrust between all parties.

And the really huge elephant in the room is that as Trump’s Board of Peace has been negotiating he has embarked on a war with Iran, from which he cannot seem to extricate himself without facing more utter humiliation. This is the very regime that has for years been funding and arming Hamas and which will do all that it can to stop any process towards peace in Gaza. But he makes no mention of Iran, the country with whom he is in conflict, upon which he has spent possibly £40bn on waging war, the one that will throw everything it has at stopping the process?

Extreme caution should be applied to any Trump claim that there has been a major breakthrough in Gaza. It is also possible that any peace in Gaza will now also depend on what happens between the Whatever is the truth behind another big, headline screaming Trump announcement, it is the next step, a development, perhaps even a positive movement forward and not a signed, sealed and delivered fact. With Trump it very rarely is.