VIVIAN SALAMA: Despite his best efforts, President Trump did not win this year's Nobel Peace Prize, the award he has long coveted and lobbied for since his first term in the White House.

If there's a silver lining for the president, the award is typically given for achievements made the previous year.

So, in 2026, Trump may be a stronger candidate because of what could be a historic deal he brokered between Israel and Hamas that ends the fighting in Gaza.

The ceasefire is underway and the last of the Israelis still held hostage are set to be released as early as next week.

But enormous challenges remain even as the bombs fell silent.

Gaza is largely demolished and trust on both sides is deeply fractured, making the road to lasting peace in the region fragile.

Joining me tonight to discuss this and more, Nancy Cordes is chief White House correspondent for CBS, David Ignatius, a foreign affairs columnist at The Washington Post, Jonathan Karl is the chief Washington correspondent for ABC News and the author of the soon to be released book, Retribution, Donald Trump, and the Campaign That Changed America, and Mark Mazzetti is a Washington correspondent at The New York times.

Thank you all so much for joining me.

David, I want to start with you.

You had a really gripping piece yesterday in The Washington Post where you started it off by saying, war's end is like waking up from a nightmare.

It was so striking.

Can you kind of take us behind the scenes into the contours of this plan, what we can expect to see in the coming weeks and months?

DAVID IGNATIUS, Columnist, The Washington Post: So, as you said, the guns did fall silent today with the Israeli Knesset approving the deal.

The ceasefire has begun.

Israeli troops have begun a partial withdrawal.

They'll still occupy about half of Gaza.

And we've now begun a 72-hour process, a window in which the hostages are to be released, 20 living, the remains of 28 dead.

And many Palestinian prisoners, probably well over a thousand, will be released.

And aid will, in theory, surge back into Gaza ending the terrible suffering, we hope, of the Palestinian people.

This is phase one of the deal.

What's still left is everything else.

And those are all the crucial things for the future stability of Gaza, the disarmament of Hamas, the transitional governance, in which technocrats will take over governance of the enclave, and a process that will hopefully provide security for the people of Gaza with international help.

Just to say one personal thing, I felt today watching the scenes, I was in Gaza in November a month after the October 7th attack that began this terrible war.

And I watched as the civilian population of Gaza City streamed out of Gaza City, moving south, moving, they hope, towards safety.

It was just a scene of desperation.

Today, I saw pictures of a line as long as that one I saw in November moving back from the south toward Gaza City, and I had a sense of, I hope, the beginning of an ending of this war.

VIVIAN SALAMA: The beginning of an end, and certainly so many challenges ahead, but still the White House seems cautiously optimistic.

Nancy, you were there this afternoon.

Take us behind the scenes.

How's the president feeling about all of this and as well as those around him?

NANCY CORDES, Chief White House Correspondent, CBS News: Yes, I, the president is pumped.

I was in the Oval Office with him a few hours ago.

He likes to talk about the fact that people are dancing in the streets, not just in Israel and in Gaza, but around the Middle East.

But behind the scenes, I would say that senior advisers are nervous because they will say openly that there are still so many things that can go wrong.

And so they are on high alert diplomatically to try to troubleshoot, you know, the details of this very fragile plan, especially in the early days where they know they've seen this movie before.

Phase one started off well, the last time that they created a multi-stage plan, and then fell apart, and we saw seven months of some of the worst fighting of this entire war.

And so the hope is that if problems do pop up, they're better prepared this time to find ways to solve them.

VIVIAN SALAMA: I mean, Jon, this is objectively a very momentous moment.

Just to get a permanent ceasefire that both sides agree to is huge.

President Biden had tried for the year-and-a-half or so, more than that actually, that he was in office and fell short on getting that ceasefire to hold, even temporary ceasefires.

President Trump comes in.

He says that the war would never have even started if he was president.

Of course that is hard to qualify, but he got it done.

He said he was going to get it done and he got it done.

What do you think changed?

What's different between both presidents and just the time that's passed?

JONATHAN KARL, Chief Washington Correspondent, ABC News: Well, first, it is an incredible moment.

I mean, just to see the -- as David mentioned, the lines going back into Northern Gaza, aid about to be resumed, you know, hopefully an end to the famine, an end to one of the worst humanitarian crises of our time, an end to the war.

I mean, Bibi Netanyahu had announced, you know, an offensive, a major offensive into Gaza City, some of the worst fighting, worst Israeli attacks of the war.

And now you have, as the agreement says, the war will end.

It is -- you know, look, Trump is the person that made this come together.

Trump is the one who, on one hand, gave the green light to the Israelis to do all they did.

There was no talk of holding back weapons, but also pressured the Israelis.

I mean, this 20-point plan includes the statement and immediate end of the war at a time when Netanyahu was absolutely not wanting to end this war or wanting to continue this war, and it also says amnesty, amnesty for members of Hamas who commit to peaceful coexistence, amnesty.

So, that -- Bibi Netanyahu does not sign on to something like this without immense pressure, and Donald Trump can pressure Netanyahu in a way that Biden simply could not.

VIVIAN SALAMA: Now, President Trump was asked today at the White House about the ceasefire.

Here's what he said.

REPORTER: And how confident are you that the ceasefire will hold?

DONALD TRUMP, U.S.

President: I think it'll hold, yes.

I think it'll hold.

They're all tired of the fighting.