October 2025
The diplomacy that circles and intends to circle, and finally, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is entering the most complex phase in the last twenty years. After the 2023 escalation and the wave of violence that caught up in Gaza, the West Bank, and the Northern part of Israel, the year 2025 brought along an illusion of stabilization, but not the solution as well. The war left deep disruptions in the regional security architecture, while the international community once again showed a limited capacity for turning a military outcome into a sustainable political process.
The Israeli government, relying on the right-wing conservative coalition, insists on the principle of “security before sovereignty”. The Palestinian leadership, weakened by internal divisions and the collapse of legitimacy, remains diplomatically isolated, with an elevated jump in the form of a cascade of recognitions of the Palestinian state. The landscape that formed after the crisis no longer exhibits the characteristics of a classical peace process. It is fragmented, multipolar, and intertwined with the competition of great powers.
During 2025, it has become clear that the model of negotiations under the umbrella of one chief mediator – in practice, the United States of America – no longer has effects. The new realities, both in the field and in global politics, have opened up a space for a multitude of actors: Qatar, Egypt, Turkey, and China. Even though Washington is formally still the most significant mediator, its influence is limited by internal political cleavages and fatigue of the public from Middle Eastern conflicts. The European Union, despite its strong economic instruments, remains politically disharmonized, which enables the other actors to position themselves as alternative moderators. Beijing is increasingly often promoting the alternative model of mediation, backed by economic leverage and strict respect of sovereignty, with the ambition to show that it can offer a pragmatic, and not ideological form of stabilization.
The collapse of the traditional peace framework has created a space for what is nowadays described as “low-voltage diplomacy” – negotiations through humanitarian channels, energy projects and local security deals, and not through grand political declarations. The regional context defines the rhythm of these initiatives to a great extent. Saudi Arabia, which has, in the last several months, made some steps forward towards normalization of relations with Israeli officials through “energy dialogue”, is more and more intensively using its negotiator’s role to increase its regional influence without confrontation with Iran. Tehran continues the politics of “limited escalation”, supporting Hezbollah and some Palestinian factions, at the same time avoiding the open conflict that would endanger their own economic stability.
At the same time, Egypt and Jordan tend to maintain their statuses as strongholds of stability, but are currently facing stronger pressure from the local public that expects a harsher stance towards the Israeli operations in Gaza. This pressure spills over into the diplomatic forums, where the Arab countries are more and more often conditioning cooperation with the West on political concessions in favor of the Palestinians.
Israel continued in 2025 to implement the strategy of dual control – military domination on the field and diplomatic minimization of risks. Even though the borders rest formally unchanged, the territory currently under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority is in fact fragmented through various security arrangements. In parallel with that, Israel is spreading its international economic cooperation as an instrument of diplomatic legitimization. Partnerships with Greece, Cyprus, and India, as well as an accelerated cooperation with the countries of Africa, have the task of confirming that Israel remains linked globally and is not an isolated actor.
Such an approach comes with a price. The absence of a political process is additionally deepening the frustration in the Palestinian territories, where the economic collapse and hopelessness incite a new wave of militancy. A cyclic mechanism is created: security serves as an explanation for the absence of negotiations, and the absence of negotiations generates new security risks.
In 2025, the international community remains trapped in a paradox: even though it routinely condemns violence, it rarely succeeds in articulating concrete steps towards a permanent solution. The UN resolutions remain without executive weight, while the sanctions and political conditioning system are losing their credibility in the situation of global polarization.
The concept of micro-diplomacy is affirmed in diplomacy, implying coordination of single initiatives, such as humanitarian corridors, supply with energy sources, or exchange of prisoners, which are seen as the “building blocks” of the future peace process. Even though this approach does not solve the key issues of status, it enables controlled de-escalation and maintains channels of communication.
The conflict between Israel and Palestine remains one of the most persistent hotspots of contemporary diplomacy in the era of fragmented power. What emerged in 2025 is not a new peace process, but a gradual turnaround from the policy of solution to the policy of crisis management. If the diplomatic attempts are not aligned with the real circumstances on the field – economic, demographic, and security ones – the world will continue to witness the renewal of the same pattern: violence, ceasefire, partial normalization, and new escalation. In the moment of a deep reshaping of the international order, the issue of Israel and Palestine remains a reminder that peace, even in the twenty-first century, is above all a political decision, and not a technical task.
Author: dr Violeta Rašković Talović