Tomorrow Is Yesterday: Life, Death, and the Pursuit of Peace in Israel/Palestine

by Hussein Agha, Robert Malley

Overview

Two insiders explain why the Israeli–Palestinian peace process failed, and anticipate what lies ahead.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas fighters killed more than eleven hundred Israelis and took more than two hundred hostages, prompting an Israeli response that has in turn taken tens of thousands of lives and devastated the Gaza Strip. Why did this happen, and can anything be done to grant peace and justice to Israelis and Palestinians alike?

In Tomorrow Is Yesterday, the analyst Hussein Agha and the diplomat Robert Malley offer a personal and bracing perspective on how the hopes of the Oslo Peace Process became the horrors of the present. Drawing on their experience advising the Palestinian leadership (Arafat and Abbas) and US presidents (Clinton, Obama, and Biden) and their participation in secret talks over decades, Agha and Malley offer candid portraits of leading figures and an interpretation of the conflict that exposes the delusions of all sides. They stress that the two-state solution became a global goal only when it was no longer viable; that U.S. officials preferred technical schemes to a frank reckoning with the past; that Hamas’s onslaught and Israel’s war of destruction were not historical exceptions but historical reenactments; and that the gaps separating Israelis and Palestinians have less to do with territorial allocation than with history and emotions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780374617134
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	09/16/2025
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272

About the Author

Hussein Agha has been involved in Israeli-Palestinian affairs and negotiations for more than half a century. He was a senior associate fellow at Chatham House and, until 2023, had been a senior associate member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford for over 25 years. He has co-authored books on Syria, Iran, Palestinian national security, and Track-II diplomacy with A. S. Khalidi. He is the editor of Mideast Mirror.

Robert Malley has served in senior Middle East positions in the administrations of Presidents Clinton, Obama, and Biden. He was President and CEO of the International Crisis Group. He is the author of The Call from Algeria and currently is Senior Fellow and Lecturer at Yale University’s Jackson School.

Hussein Agha and Robert Malley’s joint writings have appeared in several major publications.

Hussein Agha has been involved in Israeli-Palestinian affairs and negotiations for more than half a century. He was a senior associate fellow at Chatham House and, until 2023, had been a senior associate member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford for over 25 years. He has co-authored books on Syria, Iran, Palestinian national security, and Track-II diplomacy with A. S. Khalidi. He is the editor of Mideast Mirror.

Robert Malley has served in senior Middle East positions in the administrations of Presidents
Clinton, Obama, and Biden. He was President and CEO of the International Crisis Group. He is
the author of The Call from Algeria and currently is Senior Fellow and Lecturer at Yale
University’s Jackson School.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Tomorrow Is Yesterday

“Beautifully written . . . [Agha and Malley are] two people who have genuinely distinct perspectives on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and who have been in the room . . . A great book." —Chris Hayes (from "The Ezra Klein Show"

“Tomorrow Is Yesterday performs the vital service of encompassing competing narratives, cutting through lies, and telling the full story of how and why efforts to achieve a two-state solution repeatedly failed. This is an honest, eloquent, courageous, and deeply personal blend of history and memoir written by two people who have been at the center of the politics of Israel–Palestine for decades, and still insist upon a future that must be better than the excruciatingly painful present.” —Ben Rhodes, former deputy national security advisor and author of After the Fall: The Rise of Authoritarianism in the World We’ve Made

“The Middle East is the birthplace of the most influential religious traditions, and its inability to find peace constantly reignites the bitter resentments that plague our world. With their powerful narrative and elegant prose, the authors explain very convincingly why neither the local protagonists nor the foreign mediators have been able to put an end to the ordeal—and why tomorrow doesn’t look more promising than yesterday.” —Amin Maalouf, perpetual secretary of the Académie Française and author of Origins and The Crusades Through Arab Eyes

“Fascinating and essential reading for anyone interested in the Israel–Palestine conflict and peace process, this bleak yet bracing, vivid, and acute work, part analysis, part memoir, part history, by two veteran negotiators, one Palestinian, one American, is one of the best I’ve read on the Middle East peace process and the October 7 wars. I read it in one sitting.” —Simon Sebag Montefiore, author of Jerusalem: The Biography

“An exceptional book in the genre, Tomorrow Is Yesterday offers a brilliant and uniquely perceptive interpretation of what may be the most resilient, intricate, and multifaceted conflict of modern times. Combining the competencies of the historian and the essayist, even the dramatist, with the perspective of the insider, the authors lead us from the prehistory of the “peace process” and its presumed highest moments to its deceptions, mis-encounters, and tragic decline into oblivion. An unorthodox interpretation of the Israel–Hamas War, brilliantly woven into the book, makes it even more urgently relevant reading. Though it can be read as an obituary for the two-state solution, this is not a nihilistic treatise. The future scenarios the authors discuss could make the future somewhat brighter than “yesterday.” —Shlomo Ben-Ami, former foreign minister of Israel and author of Prophets Without Honor: The 2000 Camp David Summit and the End of the Two-State Solution

“This must-read book is the work of two experienced deep thinkers who are strong believers in peace. True to the character of its authors in its thoughtfulness, creativity, and constructive candor, it brings to life the pain of the Israeli–Palestinian tragedies and offers important insights into the politics and personalities of Middle Eastern peacemaking. It is highly recommended for all believers in the greater good.” —Nabil Fahmy, former foreign minister of Egypt

From the Publisher

2025-06-13
Hard lessons from decades of Middle East diplomacy.

Reflecting on their long-term efforts to reduce violence between Israelis and Palestinians, Agha, a scholar who has represented the latter in peace talks, and Malley, a veteran of the last three Democratic presidential administrations, pen a doleful epitaph for the so-called two-state solution. The authors started their careers hoping to help establish “a single entity in which Jews and Arabs would coexist as equals.” Eventually, they yielded to “what appeared at the time the more realistic and pragmatic objective”—a Palestinian state bordering Israel. But Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel—and Israel’s ongoing counterattacks in Gaza—have muted such ideas. The best the authors hope for today is that peace negotiators consider “a departure from convention,” one that would neither accept the current carnage nor impose one- or two-state compromises doomed to failure. They offer several alternatives. Among the most concrete are a truth and reconciliation process and the establishment of “a Jordanian-Palestinian confederation.” Such a link “has historical antecedents” and might help address an otherwise intractable dispute: “What Israelis would not hand over to a Palestinian state, they might grant a joint entity headed by Jordan.” While looking ahead, the authors offer a riveting insiders’ account of high-stakes statesmanship. Then–Secretary of State John Kerry brought unequaled “passion and enthusiasm” to the negotiations, but his work was for naught, in part because his boss—President Obama—didn’t leverage the billions of dollars in U.S. military aid that goes to Israel to forge lasting peace. Past Palestinian leaders were often chided for “never miss[ing] an opportunity to miss an opportunity,” but the authors, looking closely at peace talks since the 1990s, demonstrate that this is a major oversimplification.

A fascinating postmortem of failed statesmanship in a fraught region—and a guarded plea for new ideas.

Kirkus Reviews