Hamas’s response to Donald Trump’s Gaza plan is a major step towards peace but reveals several significant points of contention that could derail progress to a deal.
Hamas indicated it was ready to release its hostages, two years after it attacked Israel on 7 October 2023. The US President subsequently ordered Israel to stop bombing Gaza – something the US has not done so far during the war – declaring: “We’re very close to achieving” peace in the Middle East.
However, Hamas has requested further talks, and on Saturday Israel continued striking Gaza, according to the enclave’s civil defence agency.
Hamas has partially accepted the US President’s plan to bring the war with Israel to an end, but the group’s senior officials have suggested there are still major disagreements that require further negotiations.
Trump appeared to acknowledge the significant distance still to be worked out. “We’ll see how it all turns out. We have to get the final word down and concrete,” he said.
While Hamas’s response is being widely recognised as a “significant step forwards” on the road to peace, experts have raised concerns about its failure to agree to several foundational elements, and doubts about whether this latest development will achieve peace.
Hamas’s statement is “no question a positive development… albeit one that is likely to expose all sides’ intentions and constraints going forward”, said Jennifer Gavito, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative and former US acting principal deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs.
Ahmed F Alkhatib, director of the Atlantic Council’s Realign For Palestine project and native of Gaza City, said the US President’s response reflects either “a desperate desire to end this war at all costs or a grave misunderstanding” of what Hamas has agreed to.
How to get the hostages home safely
Under Trump’s plan, Hamas would release the remaining 48 hostages – around 20 of them believed to be alive – “within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement”.
Hamas has agreed to free all those taken captive in the 7 October attacks, both living and dead.
It announced its approval of handing over the hostages “according to the exchange formula contained in President Trump’s proposal, with the necessary field conditions for implementing the exchange”, but did not provide further detail on what the “necessary field conditions” were.
Logistically, it will be difficult to transfer the hostages to safety within this timeframe, not least because Hamas is not believed to hold all of them.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Hamas ally that also holds Israeli hostages, has endorsed the militant group’s response to the US plan for peace.
Adam Ma’anit, whose cousin was taken hostage by Hamas, said families were “cautiously optimistic” about the deal. He told Sky News: “Until the actual hostage exchange happens, anything could blow up the deal at any moment. We’ve had that happen before.”
Disarmament still a sticking point
Hamas has refused two key Israeli demands included in Trump’s plan: that Hamas must disarm and disband.
In a copy of its response seen by Reuters, Hamas did not say if it would agree to disarm and demilitarise Gaza, orders it has rejected before.
It also did not agree to an Israeli troop withdrawal in stages. Hamas demands an immediate, full withdrawal.
A senior Hamas official told Al Jazeera that the group would not disarm before Israel’s occupation of the enclave ended, comments that underscored the gap between the parties.
The Islamist militant group’s reluctance to disarm comes as no surprise to experts.
Jonathan Panikoff, director of Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative and former US deputy national intelligence officer for the Near East, said that the proposal’s “insistence that Hamas be disarmed,” among other conditions, “were never going to be accepted by the group”.
Whether these developments will lead to an end of the war in Gaza in the coming days “will ultimately turn on the question of Hamas’ disarmament, as well as on the sequencing of Israeli hostages being released and Israel Defence Forces’ withdrawal from Gaza,” Panikoff added.
Governance of Gaza
Hamas has rejected the plan for temporary international governance of Gaza. The issue of a proposed postwar international security force and who would participate “will be fraught,” says Gavito.
The peace plan also instructs Hamas to give up power, which it has steadfastly resisted.
Under the plan: “Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee,” though it does not identify any Palestinian individual or group by name as being involved in the transition.
The panel would be supervised by a new international transitional body that Trump would head and which would include other members, including former UK Prime Minister Sir Tony Blair.
Hamas reiterated openness to handing power over to a politically independent Palestinian body. But it said aspects of the proposal touching on the future of the Gaza Strip and Palestinian rights should be decided on the basis of a “unanimous Palestinian stance” reached with other factions and based on international law.
Gavito said: “Some Arab countries have already made clear their participation is contingent on a clear Israeli commitment to Palestinian sovereignty and a return of the Palestinian Authority [PA] to Gaza.” Under the plan, after a period of significant reform, governance of Gaza would be transferred to the PA.
Alkhatib said it was “concerning” that “Hamas wants to have influence and a role in how the Strip is governed” in a postwar settlement. He said this demand “presents a very serious risk of Hamas realising one of its long-sought goals, which is to reign but not directly rule” over Gaza, which he says is a “cheaper and more palatable option” to Hamas.
Israel’s position
In return for Hamas adhering to the plan, Israel is to halt its offensive and withdraw from much of the territory, release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and allow an influx of humanitarian aid and eventual reconstruction.
It would also axe plans to relocate much of Gaza’s population to other countries.
Israel said it was preparing to implement the “first stage” of Trump’s plan. It has been reported that the country’s forces have moved into a defensive position in Gaza overnight. However, the Israeli military warned Gaza city residents on Saturday that it remained a “dangerous” combat zone.
Netanyahu’s office also said Israel would work “in full cooperation” with the US President to end the war in accordance with its principles. But airstrikes persisted early on Saturday, although they were less intense.
Netanyahu will “almost certainly” be “disappointed” with Trump’s stance on Hamas’s reply, Panikoff said, since it could signal US support for reopening negotiations on the peace proposal.
Panikoff likened Hamas’s response to “a play out of Iran’s playbook”. Without a simple yes or no to the plan, Hamas is seeking “to buy time through a muddled response that seeks to redirect the pressure” to the government of Netanyahu, he said.
