For more on today's events, we turn to two people with extensive experience trying to negotiate peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.

Dennis Ross played leading roles in the Middle East peace process for both Democratic and Republican administrations.

He's now at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. That's a Washington think tank.

And Rob Malley had high-level positions on the National

Security Council staff in the Clinton, Obama, and Biden administrations. He's now senior

fellow at Yale University. Gentlemen, welcome to you both. And thank you for joining us. Before we

get to what comes next, I want to just put to each of you to answer briefly on how we got here. Rob,

start us off here. Why do you think this president now

was able to get done what his predecessor was not? Well, first, I mean, he put together a peace plan,

which is an eyesore. I mean, it, you know, it demands atonement for the Palestinians for what happened

on the massacre of October 7th. It doesn't demand the torment for what Israel's barbar massacre of October 7. It doesn't demand

the torment for what Israel's barbaric war that followed. It is, you know, it is cause for Gaza's

de-radicalization, but not for Israel's. It micromanages the future of the Palestinian self-governance.

It doesn't say anything about the future of Israel's occupation. It's riddled with ambiguities. And yet for all that, despite all that, it's a major achievement

by the president. And it was achieved, again, despite all the criticism that I just leveled,

because he adopted a form of unconventional politics where he just exercised raw power, was prepared

to break convention.

He spoke to Hamas.

He put pressure on Israel.

He also gave guarantees to both sides.

And it was a form of politics that his predecessor was simply not able or willing to exert.

Dennis Ross, do you agree with that? In this case, Rob is saying that the man himself was more important than the plan.

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