The News
The Trump administration deserves “a lot of credit” for brokering the ceasefire deal in Gaza, former US President Joe Biden’s top energy and infrastructure diplomat said Thursday.
“I think it’s a great deal and I’m very happy that it happened,” Amos Hochstein, who also led some Middle East policy, said at Semafor’s World Economy Summit.
“Seeing 20 people who’ve sat in a hell for two years going back to their families, no one can criticize that,” Hochstein said. His only “tinge of disappointment” was that a truce and hostage return didn’t happen earlier. A January ceasefire saw Hamas release some Israeli hostages but failed to advance to later stages.
“I think that it could have continued. I don’t know that it would have been possible. It’s impossible to know,” said Hochstein, who helped broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in November 2024, and is now a managing partner at the investment firm TWG Global.
Know More
Hochstein also found common ground with the Trump administration on the issue of selling American chips to Gulf partners.
Some have criticized such deals — like the ones Trump announced on his trip through Gulf states earlier this year — saying they put American technology in the hands of foreign partners and could open the door to adversaries like China gaining access.
But Hochstein said the US has “never been able to restrict technology,” and should instead aggressively court allies that could otherwise fall into China’s sphere of influence.
“I agree with President Trump on this. We have to win this war with China, this competition,” he said. “And if we do it alone, then I believe, today, we will lose that war.”
He said he would “rather work with the UAE than with Spain. Spain is a European country, but they’ve put Huawei in their intelligence systems. So I’d rather go to countries and say on this issue, it’s binary.”