Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sparked buzz online after posting an AI-generated image of himself handing Donald Trump a Nobel Peace Prize medal—just hours before the U.S.
president is set to learn if he’s actually won the real thing.
The image, shared on Netanyahu’s X (formerly Twitter) account, shows Trump beaming under a shower of confetti, wearing an oversized gold medal as a cheering crowd waves Israeli flags. Behind him hangs a banner that reads: “Peace Through Strength.”
“Give Donald Trump the Nobel Peace Prize — he deserves it,” Netanyahu wrote in the caption.
The post comes as speculation mounts that Trump could be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize today, following Israel’s approval of his ceasefire and hostage-release deal with Hamas. The announcement coincides with the two-year anniversary of the deadly October 7 attacks.
Trump’s Gaza deal
On Wednesday, Trump declared that Israel and Hamas had agreed to the first phase of a ceasefire after several days of indirect negotiations in Egypt. Netanyahu’s government confirmed on Thursday that it had given final approval, bringing an end to 734 days of fighting.
“The government has just now approved the framework for the release of all of the hostages — the living and the deceased,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
According to Israeli officials, the ceasefire took effect immediately after the vote. The Israeli military was ordered to withdraw from Gaza within 24 hours along a designated line.
The deal faced fierce resistance from Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, but was ultimately approved.
Under the terms of Trump’s agreement, Hamas will release all remaining hostages—both living and dead—in exchange for roughly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. That includes 250 inmates serving life sentences and 1,700 Gazans detained since the October 7 attacks.
“We’re getting the hostages back Monday or Tuesday,” Trump said earlier this week. “That’ll be a day of joy.”
Peacekeepers and reactions
The U.S. plans to send 200 troops to help monitor the ceasefire, though a senior American official clarified that they will not be deployed inside Gaza. Instead, a “joint task force” involving Egypt, Qatar, Turkey, and the UAE will oversee the agreement.
Scenes of celebration broke out on both sides of the conflict Thursday night. Israelis gathered at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, waving flags and cheering the news, while Palestinians flooded the streets of Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah, celebrating the promise of peace.
Trump’s bid for the Nobel
Trump has long argued that he deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. Families of freed hostages have even written to the Norwegian Nobel Committee urging them to honor him, saying he “brought light to our darkest times” with his 20-point peace plan for Gaza.
The president insists his efforts extend far beyond the Middle East, claiming credit for easing tensions between Cambodia and Thailand, Kosovo and Serbia, Congo and Rwanda, Pakistan and India, Egypt and Ethiopia, and Armenia and Azerbaijan.
“I deserve it, but they’ll never give it to me,” Trump said in February. “They gave it to Obama for doing nothing but destroying our country.”
Barack Obama famously received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, just eight months into his first term — a decision Trump still mocks to this day.
“I’ve stopped eight wars — that’s never happened before,” he told reporters this week. “But whatever they do is fine. I didn’t do it for that. I did it because I saved lives.”
Experts say it’s still a long shot
Despite Trump’s high-profile diplomacy and past nominations—including for the 2020 Abraham Accords that normalized ties between Israel and several Arab nations—experts say his chances of actually winning remain slim.
Favorites this year reportedly include The Emergency Response Rooms, a volunteer network delivering humanitarian aid amid Sudan’s civil war, and Yulia Navalnaya, widow of slain Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Last year’s prize went to Nihon Hidankyo, a Japanese organization of atomic bomb survivors advocating against nuclear weapons.
The Nobel Peace Prize is the only one of the annual awards presented in Oslo, Norway. Other prizes in medicine, physics, chemistry, and literature have already been announced in Stockholm earlier this week, with the economics prize set to follow on Monday. Photo by ProtoplasmaKid / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-SA 4.0