Israel’s prime minister said the government never approved the U.S.-backed proposal, placing the sequence of Hamas disarmament and an Israeli military withdrawal at the center of the dispute over President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly rejected a U.S.-backed proposal for disarming Hamas on Tuesday, declaring that Israeli forces will not withdraw from their current positions in Gaza until the terrorist organization has fully surrendered its weapons.
The disagreement between Israel and the Trump-backed Board of Peace had emerged by Wednesday as the most significant barrier to implementing President Donald Trump’s 20-point framework for ending the Gaza war.
The disputed proposal was developed through separate talks involving Hamas, the Board of Peace and mediators representing Egypt, Qatar, Turkey and the United States. Under the original framework, Hamas would begin turning over its weapons while Israeli forces simultaneously withdrew to the Yellow Line established through the October 2025 ceasefire.
Israel initially pulled back to that boundary last fall. Its forces have since expanded their presence from approximately 53% of the Gaza Strip to more than 60%.
Netanyahu said in a video posted on Facebook that Trump and members of his administration believe they can achieve both the disarmament of Hamas and the broader demilitarization of Gaza. He emphasized, however, that the Israeli government did not approve the proposal now under discussion.
“We did not agree to it. It was not our draft,” Netanyahu said, adding that Israel had submitted its own comments to American negotiators.
The disarmament framework had been presented as an extension of the larger peace agreement Israel accepted last fall.
A senior U.S. official said last week that Trump would be “very disappointed” if the Israeli government prevented the plan from moving forward.
Board of Peace representatives, led by High Representative Nickolay Mladenov, traveled to Jerusalem on Monday in an effort to persuade Netanyahu to support the proposal.
After that meeting, the board appeared to revise the plan in a manner closer to Israel’s position. It said any Israeli withdrawal beyond the Yellow Line would take place only after Hamas completed the process of decommissioning its weapons.
That change could jeopardize the agreement with Hamas. The group spent months negotiating the arrangement and has maintained that its disarmament must occur at the same time as an Israeli military withdrawal.
Israel made one operational concession by tightening its rules of engagement. Individual military strikes now require approval from the Israel Defense Forces chief of staff and the country’s political leadership.
Netanyahu did not dispute that the rules had been changed. He said Israeli forces would continue taking whatever action they considered necessary to protect themselves and Israeli territory.
The disagreement leaves mediators and the White House responsible for determining how negotiations proceed.
Should the Board of Peace preserve the revised sequence announced after Monday’s meeting, Hamas could withdraw from the agreement. Returning to the original arrangement, however, would face opposition from Netanyahu, who has indicated that he will not support it as Israel approaches national elections.
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