Peace Rebranded by War Criminals

Trump’s Nobel nomination mocks justice glorifies bombs over diplomacy.

If Hollywood was to ever make a movie of two war criminals attempting to rebrand peace in their image, you’d think it was a comedy - not even the creative geniuses in Tinseltown are that dark, delusional and dishonest.

The Nobel Peace Prize has always been an ward that’s been as controversial as it’s been prestigious, politicised, and polarising, however, Benjamin Netanyahu nominating Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize isn’t just two madmen attempting to hijack and criminalise the very idea of nobility—it’s a provocation wrapped in delusion.

The nomination has triggered a wave of condemnation, with prominent human rights experts, legal scholars, and foreign policy analysts calling it a cynical attempt to whitewash 80 years of war, occupation, genocide and oppression.

In a public ceremony at the White House Blue Room, Netanyahu handed Trump a letter he’d sent to the Nobel Prize Committee, praising Trump’s “bold leadership” in reshaping the Middle East and securing the Abraham Accords—diplomatic deals between Israel and several Arab nations, including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Morocco. All, however, is delusion based on fantasy and a lie. Trump has not reshaped the Middle East; instead, he has deepened its fractures, emboldened autocrats, sidelined the Palestinians, and traded justice for spectacle.

His policies did not advance peace—they entrenched inequality, legitimised occupation, and further destabilised a region already buckling under decades of conflict.

“President Trump’s vision and bold leadership promoted innovative diplomacy defined not by conflict and extremism but by cooperation, dialogue, and shared prosperity,” Netanyahu wrote. Sitting beside Trump, he added: “You should get it.”

The performance of both Trump and Netanyahu is nothing more than political theatre designed to mask a deeply destructive record.

“The Abraham Accords were more about selling weapons and forging authoritarian alliances than securing peace,” Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the US-based peace group Codepink, said. “They ignored the Palestinian people entirely. Peace doesn’t come from backroom deals between regimes; it comes from justice and equality.”

Benjamin, a longtime critic of US and Israeli foreign policy, said the nomination was “an insult to every civilian killed in Gaza, Yemen, Syria, and Iran as a result of policies backed or implemented by these two men.”

The announcement comes amid the ongoing genocide in Gaza, where more than 400,000 Palestinians have been killed since October 2023.

Meanwhile, Trump continues to tout his recent order to bomb three Iranian nuclear facilities as evidence of American “strength” and claimed Tehran “gained a lot of respect” from the strikes. He now says Iran has requested peace talks.

“The nomination of Trump for a peace prize after bombing Iran and supporting Israel’s siege on Gaza turns the Nobel legacy on its head,” Palestinian American human rights lawyer and Associate Professor at Rutgers University, Noura Erakat said. “You can’t have peace without addressing the root causes of violence—occupation, apartheid, and settler colonialism.”

Erakat highlightedNetanyahu has repeatedly made clear his opposition to a fully sovereign Palestinian state, saying Palestinians should have “all the powers to govern themselves, but none of the powers to threaten us”—a framework that leaves Israel in permanent control of security, borders, and airspace.

“This isn’t peace,” Erakat said. “It’s a permanent state of domination.”

Netanyahu also defended a proposed relocation plan for Palestinians in Gaza, calling it a “brilliant vision” of “free choice”—language that alarmed rights advocates who say it closely resembles ethnic cleansing.

“There’s nothing voluntary about mass displacement under siege and bombardment,”senior fellow at the Arab Centre Washington DC, Yousef Munayyer, said. “Israel wants to create a Gaza without Palestinians and call it peace. It’s a perversion of the term.”

Accordinbg to Munayyer, the Abraham Accords failed to address the Palestinian cause altogether. “This nomination glorifies a deal that traded Palestinian rights for F-35 fighter jets and diplomatic vanity. It's diplomacy built on erasure.”

As ceasefire negotiations continue—brokered by the US, Qatar, and Egypt—Hamas has agreed to a 60-day truce in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal and the release of Palestinian prisoners. But Netanyahu insists the war will continue until Hamas surrenders, disarms, and its leadership goes into exile—terms analysts call unrealistic and designed to prolong the conflict.

“This isn’t a peace process. It’s a PR campaign. The price is being paid in Palestinian blood,” Erakat said.

Trump’s Middle East legacy, critics argue, is one of unilateralism and provocation: recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, slashing aid to Palestinian refugees, shutting down the Palestinian diplomatic mission in Washington, and empowering hardline Israeli policies.

“Trump and Netanyahu are not peacemakers—they’re war managers,” said Benjamin. “This nomination is part of a broader effort to normalize endless occupation and sell it to the world as diplomacy.”

Since its inception in 1901, the Nobel Peace Prize has honoured individuals and groups who strive for disarmament, human rights, and reconciliation. Past recipients include Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, and Malala Yousafzai.

To many observers, placing Trump in that tradition is nothing short of obscene, and both Netanyahu and Trump are two men of extreme obscenity, where evil resides not in shadows but in plain sight, cloaked in self-righteousness and delusion, masquerading as diplomacy.

“If bombing Iran, starving Gaza, and denying Palestinians a future is the new standard for peace,” Munayyer said, “then we are not just dishonouring the Nobel legacy—we are actively rewriting what peace means.”