Hamas cannot commit to disarming itself and intends to remain the ruling party in Gaza during an interim period, Reuters reported on Friday, citing a senior Hamas official.
“I can’t answer with a yes or no [if Hamas is willing to disarm]. Frankly, it depends on the nature of the project. The disarmament project you’re talking about, what does it mean? To whom will the weapons be handed over?” Hamas politburo member Mohammed Nazzal asked in an interview conducted in Doha.
The subjects to be discussed in the second stage of the ceasefire agreement, including disarmament, Nazzal continued, concern other armed Palestinian groups, which have yet to decide on the matter.
Moreover, Hamas is ready for a three- to five-year ceasefire for the purpose of reconstructing the Gaza Strip, the official added.
What happens afterward depends on Palestinians, given “horizons and hope” for statehood, Reuters cited him as saying. “The goal isn’t to prepare for a future war,” Nazzal said.
He defended Hamas’s public street executions last week that were filmed and published in the media, saying that “exceptional measures” are always taken during war.
Speaking about Hamas’s rapid campaign to reassert its control over the parts of the Strip it holds, the senior Hamas official said, “This is a transitional phase. Civilly, there will be a technocratic administration as I said. On the ground, Hamas will be present.”
A Gazan lawyer in hiding from the terrorists said that Hamas was on a spree to kill its critics in the Strip, Fox News reported.
“After the fire stopped, Hamas fighters came out of the tunnels and massacred families that opposed them,” said attorney Moumen al-Natour, a former Hamas political prisoner and president of Palestinian Youth for Development.
“They are sending a signal that they are back—by terrorizing people.”
Hamas has already breached the terms of the first stage of the ceasefire by delaying the return of all 28 deceased hostages.
“Hamas is supposed to release all hostages in stage 1. It has not,” the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office told Reuters in a statement.
“Hamas knows where the bodies of our hostages are. Hamas is to be disarmed under this agreement. No ifs, no buts. They have not. Hamas need to adhere to the 20-point plan. They are running out of time,” it added.
Washington released a 20-point peace plan on Sept. 29, calling for an immediate ceasefire, phased Israeli withdrawal from most of Gaza, Hamas releasing Israeli hostages in exchange for the Jewish state releasing nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, amnesty for Hamas members who lay down arms and creating a “technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee” to govern Gaza on a transitional basis.
“If Hamas rejects the deal, which is always possible—they’re the only one left, everyone else has accepted it—but I have a feeling that we’re going to have a positive answer,” U.S. President Donal Trump said after the public presentation of the proposal.
