For the past several years, the Washington Post’s senior diplomatic columnist, David Ignatius, has echoed the optimism of the Trump administration in predicting success for various peace plans involving the United States and Iran, Israel and Hezbollah, and Israel and Hamas. Ignatius is still at it. In an oped late last week, Ignatius predicted that despite “Trump’s hardball negotiating tactics…a deal (between Russia and Ukraine) seems to be getting closer.” (See Washington Post, December 12,2025, “The outlines of a sustainable Ukraine peace deal inch into view.”)

Ignatius makes no mention of the new National Security Strategy (NSS) from early December that demonstrated significant sympathy for Russian President Vladimir Putin alarmed our European allies. Nor did he mention the peculiar series of meetings between Ukraine’s chief diplomatic negotiator, Rustem Umerov, and the director and deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Kash Patel and Dan Bongino, which suggested U.S. pressure on Ukraine to accept Trump’s pro-Russian peace plan. Umerov, who previously served as Ukraine’s defense minister, may be implicated in the expanding corruption investigation that is burdening Zelensky’s leadership.

I can think of no national security issue that would require an FBI role with Ukraine. These unusual negotiations and Trump’s hardball tactics against Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky point to U.S. willingness to forego any corruption investigations of top Ukrainian officials if the Kyiv government accepts Trump’s one-sided plan. Both Patel and Bongino have been unsympathetic to the idea of Ukrainian sovereignty, and Trump and Vice President JD Vance have become alarmingly hostile.

Patel played a major role in Trump’s suspension of $400 million in military aid to Ukraine in the past. Our European allies have good reason to be concerned that the FBI chief is playing a role in negotiations with Ukrainian officials.

In addition to Patel’s consistent criticism of the extent of U.S. military and economic aid to Ukraine, Bongino has accused Zelensky of covering up the allegedly corrupt activities of President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, in Ukraine. Trump is still angry that Zelensky ignored his demands that Zelensky find dirt on Biden prior to the presidential election in 2020.

Ignatius still believes that Trump is willing to extend an “Article 5-like” mutual security guarantee for Ukraine. There is no evidence that Trump is willing to move in that direction, and the NSS was very sympathetic to Putin’s demands that there must be some reversal in the expansion of NATO’s military occupation in Central Europe as well as some decoupling of U.S. security interests from NATO.

For the past year, Ignatius has been a reliable stenographer in repeating U.S. optimism regarding the various peace plans that involve Israeli and U.S. national security interests. He sees opportunities for the deployment of a European and Arab peacekeeping force in Gaza to begin “stabilization operations” in Gaza, which would require that the United States provide a military command-and-control center based in Egypt near the Gaza border. There is no evidence that Israel would allow an international stabilization force in Gaza.

Ignatius rarely refers to Israel’s increased violence in the West Bank, which continues to worsen Israeli relations with the Palestinians and the Arab states. Israeli violence on the West Bank includes possible war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits an occupying power from transferring parts of its civilian population into occupied territory, which Israel has been doing for the past six decades. Nor does Ignatius mention a recent Israeli law that would allow deportation of family members of Palestinian attackers, including Palestinians who are Israeli citizens.

Ignatius continues to do the Trump administration’s bidding or, more simply, his wishes may be father to his optimistic thoughts. In the process, he ignores Israeli violations of the ceasefires in Gaza and Lebanon as well as continued Israeli use of force in Syria. Israel is threatening more war against Iran while the United States prefers a search for stability in the area.

As for peace plans regarding Ukraine, he ignores the important elements that would require that Ukraine give up territory that Russia doesn’t occupy and provides no security guarantees for Ukraine in the future. Zelensky has been adamant that he will not surrender territory that Ukraine still controls in the eastern region and that the loss of any territory to Russia would have to be approved by a parliamentary vote. At the same time, there is no indication that Putin, who believes that Russia is winning, will agree to any plan to end the war.

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