U.S. President Donald Trump gave credit to Hamas for releasing the final bodies of hostages it held in Gaza on Thursday at a cabinet meeting at the White House.
“Hamas was a big factor in getting all of the hostages back,” Trump said. “We were not happy with them, and they had to bring them back, and they found the dead hostages.”
“They did help us with those bodies, getting them out,” Trump added.
The Israel Defense Forces recovered the body of the final hostage in Gaza, Ran Gvili, on Monday.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee wrote on Monday that Hamas “should get no credit” for Gvili’s return after months in which the terrorist group claimed that it did not know the location of his body.
“Hamas didn’t ‘release’ him—the IDF and Shin Bet found and recovered him,” Huckabee said.
Hamas claimed after the IDF operation, in which Gvili’s body was located in a cemetery in northern Gaza, that it had provided Israel with information that contributed to his recovery.
Directing questions to U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff during Thursday’s cabinet meeting, Trump said that the terrorist group would now disarm.
“And now we want to get Hamas—no guns, right?” Trump asked.
“They’re going to give it up, they’re going to give up the AK-47s,” Witkoff replied. “They’re going to demilitarize. They will, because they have no choice.”
A senior Hamas official said on Wednesday that Hamas has never agreed to disarm
“Not for a single moment did we talk about surrender the weapons, or any formula about destroying, surrendering or disarmament,” Musa Abu Marzouk claimed in an interview with Al Jazeera.
