By Andrew Carey, Oren Liebermann, CNN
(CNN) — When Rumiana Bachvarova was just a short period into her new position as Bulgaria’s Ambassador to Israel, she went to see her compatriot Nickolay Mladenov in Jerusalem.
He took her to the Mount of Olives, overlooking Jerusalem’s Old City.
“This small place is the cornerstone of all the conflicts here,” Mladenov told Bachvarova. “But see how beautiful it is.”
Mladenov was several years into his role as the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, a position historically seen as symbolic but ineffective. Previous diplomats who held the title issued statements condemning the expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and emphasizing the importance of the two-state solution. But they had little impact on an intractable conflict, largely ignored by the Israelis and unable to promote change with the Palestinians. They came and went without leaving a mark.
But Mladenov entered the role with a different perspective, able to build trusted relationships with both Israeli and Palestinian officials. The Bulgarian politician and diplomat had already been appointed his country’s defense minister at the age of 37, becoming the minister of foreign affairs a few months later, a role he held for 3 years. Before coming to Jerusalem in 2015, he was the UN’s Special Representative for Iraq and had earlier in his career been a member of the European Parliament.
Now Mladenov, 53, faces perhaps his most difficult task yet. As the newly announced High Representative for Gaza, he will act as the key link between US President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace” and a technocratic committee made up of Palestinian officials that’s meant to run the shattered enclave. He must turn a US-brokered 20-point-ceasefire plan lacking key details into a viable program that can rebuild Gaza, disarm Hamas, and govern two million people.
And it all has to be acceptable to the Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans for it to work.
Alongside him on the Board of Peace – though without his direct responsibilities towards the committee – will be US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, among others, the White House announced.
With little fanfare, Mladenov met last week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and senior Palestinian officials as he prepared for the job ahead.
Mladenov declined to comment on his new role. When Witkoff announced the launch of the second phase of the ceasefire on Wednesday, Mladenov reposted his message but made no statement of his own.
But he surely knew what was coming when he made a New Year’s post on X.
“As we step into 2026, here’s hoping it becomes a year where common sense prevails, where rules are respected, facts carry more weight than slogans, and strength is measured not by reckless escalation, but by thoughtful restraint and wise choices,” he wrote.
Early impressions
When Mladenov arrived in Jerusalem just over a decade ago, he was initially struck by how irrelevant the position appeared to be, according to an interview with the New York Times, given as he was leaving the role in late 2020. But Mladenov shuttled back and forth between the key players, meeting the Israelis, the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank, and Hamas in Gaza, and delivering his monthly report to the UN Security Council in New York, as mandated by his position.
He made few headlines during his time in Jerusalem, but behind the scenes he was