Senior Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal on Sunday reiterated the terrorist group’s opposition to U.S. President Donald Trump’s demand to lay down arms and vowed “to defeat our enemy, Israel, God willing.”
Speaking at the 17th Al Jazeera Forum in Doha, Qatar, Mashaal said that the Islamist group would not disarm during the current Phase 2 of Trump’s plan, which calls for Hamas to lay down its weapons with the deployment of an International Stabilization Force to the Gaza Strip.
“As long as our people are under occupation,” he told attendees, “talk of disarmament is an attempt to turn our people into victims, to make their elimination easier and to facilitate their destruction at the hands of the Israeli side, which is armed with every international means of warfare.
“Questions about the resistance’s weapons are being raised forcefully. Some want to place it in the context that whoever carried out Oct. 7 must be cornered and made to pay the price,” continued Mashaal, in reference to the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of some 1,200 people.
“As those who participated in the resistance, we must not accept this,” he declared, saying that “resistance is the right of occupied peoples.”
Mashaal praised the terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, during which around 1,200 people, primarily Jewish civilians, were murdered, thousands were wounded and 251 were taken hostage.
The massacre “returned the Palestinian cause to the forefront of regional and international attention, and it is no longer possible to bypass it; resolving it has become a necessity,” he told the forum.
Mashaal again vowed to defeat Israel, saying that the Jewish state “represents an existential threat and danger to us and the region.”
Asked about the U.S.-backed National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, a transitional Palestinian body meant to exclude Hamas, Mashaal stressed the terrorist organization’s rejection of “foreign rule” over the Strip.
“We do not accept the logic of guardianship, foreign intervention or the re-imposition of a new mandate,” the Hamas leader told the summit.
Mashaal praised Doha for its support of the Palestinian cause, saying, “Qatar is a small country, but its role is great and respected.”
Doha “sympathizes and has an honorable stance on the issue, but Israel resents it,” he said. “They waged a campaign against it for this position.”
The Israeli Foreign Ministry on Thursday sharply criticized the Al Jazeera Forum, describing it as a “gathering of jihadists and their support staff.”
Trump warned on Jan. 21 that Hamas terrorists would be “blown away very quickly” if they fail to lay down their weapons under the second phase of Washington’s peace plan.
Speaking at a question-and-answer session in Davos, Switzerland, after his address to the World Economic Forum, the U.S. president said Hamas had “agreed to give up their weapons” as part of his 20-point plan.
Mashaal has repeatedly rejected demands to disarm, including on Dec. 6, when he declared that “protecting the resistance project and its weapons is the right of our people to defend themselves.
“The resistance and its weapons are the ummah‘s [Islamic nation’s] honor and pride,” he told an anti-Israel summit in Istanbul.
Senior Hamas terrorist Musa Abu Marzouk told Al Jazeera on Jan. 28 that the terrorist group had never agreed to disarm.
“Not for a single moment did we talk about surrendering weapons,” Abu Marzouk told the outlet, claiming the issue was never raised in the talks.
