26 Meanwhile, Abimelek had come to him from Gerar, with Ahuzzath his personal adviser and Phicol the commander of his forces. 27 Isaac asked them, “Why have you come to me, since you were hostile to me and sent me away?”
28 They answered, “We saw clearly that the Lord was with you; so we said, ‘There ought to be a sworn agreement between us’—between us and you. Let us make a treaty with you 29 that you will do us no harm, just as we did not harm you but always treated you well and sent you away peacefully. And now you are blessed by the Lord.”
30 Isaac then made a feast for them, and they ate and drank. 31 Early the next morning the men swore an oath to each other. Then Isaac sent them on their way, and they went away peacefully.
32 That day Isaac’s servants came and told him about the well they had dug. They said, “We’ve found water!” 33 He called it Shibah, and to this day the name of the town has been Beersheba. Genesis 26:26-33
Did Isaac have aspirations to expand his territory? Yes, but would he have done it through war? Well, King Abimelek couldn’t know for sure so he came to Isaac to declare a truce between the two. Isaac was gracious enough to accept. It’s how peace is maintained: two diplomats agreeing on terms that are mutually beneficial to the other. Essentially, it was two or three people sitting down and hammering out an agreement based on mutual respect and terms. The years have changed but the methods of maintaining peace have not.
Another method was having a son of one side marry a daughter of the other. In that way, the deal was sealed and bloodlines were intermixed.
Even though we have this textbook example of a truce, nations in the Middle East have rarely settled on permanent peace, mainly because there’s no mutual respect among the nations.
Every U.S. President since 1948 has sought to bring Israel together with many of its enemies.
And every U.S. President has failed because Israel’s enemies absolutely hate Israel. There are even sitting U.S. Congresspeople who are outspoken about being anti-Israel.