Trump and Netanyahu demand Hamas accept Gaza peace plan: Live updates

Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu outlined a multi-point plan on Monday proposing terms to end the war in Gaza.

If Hamas does not accept the deal, Israeli has threatened to use continued force to “finish the job” in a conflict that has already killed tens of thousands of civilians.

The proposal includes the return of hostages, the disarming and political removal of Hamas, and an international oversight body presiding over the territory for an unspecific period of time.

• Gaza will be a deradicalized terror-free zone that does not pose a threat to its neighbors.
• Gaza will be redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Gaza, who have suffered more than enough.
• If both sides agree to this proposal, the war will immediately end. Israeli forces will withdraw to the agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release. During this time, all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal.
• Within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement, all hostages, alive and deceased, will be returned.
• Once all hostages are released, Israel will release 250 life sentence prisoners plus 1700 Gazans who were detained after October 7th 2023, including all women and children detained in that context. For every Israeli hostage whose remains are released, Israel will release the remains of 15 deceased Gazans.
• Once all hostages are returned, Hamas members who commit to peaceful co-existence and to decommission their weapons will be given amnesty. Members of Hamas who wish to leave Gaza will be provided safe passage to receiving countries.
• Upon acceptance of this agreement, full aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip. At a minimum, aid quantities will be consistent with what was included in the January 19, 2025, agreement regarding humanitarian aid, including rehabilitation of infrastructure (water, electricity, sewage), rehabilitation of hospitals and bakeries, and entry of necessary equipment to remove rubble and open roads.
• Entry of distribution and aid in the Gaza Strip will proceed without interference from the two parties through the United Nations and its agencies, and the Red Crescent, in addition to other international institutions not associated in any manner with either party. Opening the Rafah crossing in both directions will be subject to the same mechanism implemented under the January 19, 2025 agreement.
• Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee, responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services and municipalities for the people in Gaza. This committee will be made up of qualified Palestinians and international experts, with oversight and supervision by a new international transitional body, the “Board of Peace,” which will be headed and chaired by President Donald J. Trump, with other members and heads of State to be announced, including Former Prime Minister Tony Blair. This body will set the framework and handle the funding for the redevelopment of Gaza until such time as the Palestinian Authority has completed its reform program, as outlined in various proposals, including President Trump’s peace plan in 2020 and the Saudi-French proposal, and can securely and effectively take back control of Gaza. This body will call on best international standards to create modern and efficient governance that serves the people of Gaza and is conducive to attracting investment.
• A Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energize Gaza will be created by convening a panel of experts who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East. Many thoughtful investment proposals and exciting development ideas have been crafted by well-meaning international groups, and will be considered to synthesize the security and governance frameworks to attract and facilitate these investments that will create jobs, opportunity, and hope for future Gaza.
• A special economic zone will be established with preferred tariff and access rates to be negotiated with participating countries.
• No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return. We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza.
• Hamas and other factions agree to not have any role in the governance of Gaza, directly, indirectly, or in any form. All military, terror, and offensive infrastructure, including tunnels and weapon production facilities, will be destroyed and not rebuilt. There will be a process of demilitarization of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors, which will include placing weapons permanently beyond use through an agreed process of decommissioning, and supported by an internationally funded buy back and reintegration program all verified by the independent monitors. New Gaza will be fully committed to building a prosperous economy and to peaceful coexistence with their neighbors.
• A guarantee will be provided by regional partners to ensure that Hamas, and the factions, comply with their obligations and that New Gaza poses no threat to its neighbors or its people.
• The United States will work with Arab and international partners to develop a temporary International Stabilization Force (ISF) to immediately deploy in Gaza. The ISF will train and provide support to vetted Palestinian police forces in Gaza, and will consult with Jordan and Egypt who have extensive experience in this field. This force will be the long-term internal security solution. The ISF will work with Israel and Egypt to help secure border areas, along with newly trained Palestinian police forces. It is critical to prevent munitions from entering Gaza and to facilitate the rapid and secure flow of goods to rebuild and revitalize Gaza. A deconfliction mechanism will be agreed upon by the parties.
• Israel will not occupy or annex Gaza. As the ISF establishes control and stability, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will withdraw based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarization that will be agreed upon between the IDF, ISF, the guarantors, and the Unites States, with the objective of a secure Gaza that no longer poses a threat to Israel, Egypt, or its citizens. Practically, the IDF will progressively hand over the Gaza territory it occupies to the ISF according to an agreement they will make with the transitional authority until they are withdrawn completely from Gaza, save for a security perimeter presence that will remain until Gaza is properly secure from any resurgent terror threat.
• In the event Hamas delays or rejects this proposal, the above, including the scaled-up aid operation, will proceed in the terror-free areas handed over from the IDF to the ISF.
• An interfaith dialogue process will be established based on the values of tolerance and peaceful co-existence to try and change mindsets and narratives of Palestinians and Israelis by emphasizing the benefits that can be derived from peace.
• While Gaza re-development advances and when the PA reform program is faithfully carried out, the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood, which we recognize as the aspiration of the Palestinian people.
• The United States will establish a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians to agree on a political horizon for peaceful and prosperous co-existence.

And for more on the plan, here’s Andrew Feinberg’s full story.

Civil rights groups and analysts are closely studying the sweeping White House plan for a post-war Gaza.

But there is deep skepticism over whether Israel will commit to a lasting peace — with Trump all but giving Israel a green light to continue its war against Hamas if it does not agree to Trump’s proposal.

“The world desperately needs an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, whose people have endured unspeakable horror over these past two years,” according to Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy and a former policy adviser to Senator Bernie Sanders.

“Unfortunately, the 21-point plan released by the Trump administration today, while thankfully walking back from Trump’s previous goal of expelling Gaza’s people, contains numerous opportunities for Netanyahu to renege on his commitments, as he has repeatedly done in the past,” he said in a statement. “It is not clear who has agreed to which terms of Trump’s plan, or whether Trump himself understands what is in it. Trump and Netanyahu’s remarks today were a litany of lies about the last 30 years, not a promising foundation for peace.”

Raed Jarrar, advocacy director with Democracy for the Arab World Now, said the “explicit guarantee that ‘‘no one will be forced to leave Gaza’ marks Netanyahu’s strategic defeat — Palestinians will remain in their homeland despite paying an unconscionable price.

But the plan’s “vague withdrawal conditions with no enforcement mechanisms on Israel gives Netanyahu exactly what he needs to scuttle or indefinitely delay any real peace, just as Israel has done with every previous agreement,” added DAWN’s Israel-Palestine director Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man.

“Without ending the siege on Gaza, without guaranteeing sea access and connections to the West Bank, and without addressing the root causes of occupation and apartheid, this plan may pause the genocide but leaves the conditions for future violence firmly in place,” he added.

The White House may be framing its plan to end the war in Gaza as a crowning diplomatic achievement, but it is already coming in for heavy criticism from left-leaning critics in Europe, who have seized on former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair’s proposed role on an international “peace board” that would oversee the post-conflict transition period.

“Tony Blair’s catastrophic decision to invade Iraq cost thousands upon thousands of lives,” MP and former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn wrote on X. “He shouldn’t be anywhere near the Middle East, let alone Gaza. It is not up to Blair, Trump or Netanyahu to decide the future of Gaza. That is up to the people of Palestine.”

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Meanwhile, Yanis Varoufakis, the prominent former finance minister of Greece, accused the plan of installing Blair as “the Empire’s Regent of Gaza,” presiding over a plan he called a “White Settler Colonial” project.

French President Emmanuel Macron is welcoming Trump’s plan, saying that Hamas has “no choice” but to agree to it.

“I expect Israel to engage resolutely on this basis. Hamas has no choice but to immediately release all hostages and follow this plan,” he wrote.

A joint statement from the foreign ministers of Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates says the nations welcome Trump’s “sincere efforts” to end Israel’s war in Gaza.

The statement says the countries are prepared to “reaffirm their joint commitment to work with the United States to end the war in Gaza through a comprehensive deal that ensures unrestricted delivery of sufficient humanitarian aid to Gaza, no displacement of the Palestinians, the release of hostages, a security mechanism that guarantees the security of all sides, full Israeli withdrawal, rebuilds Gaza and creates a path for a just peace on the basis of the two state solution, under which Gaza is fully integrated with the West Bank in a Palestinian state in accordance with international law as key to achieving regional stability and security.”

Notably absent in Trump’s plan: No provision or guarantees for the creation of a Palestinian state— a key demand embraced by a wave of countries as the slaughter in Gaza reaches unprecedented proportions.

Instead, Trump’s plan somewhat confusingly suggests that, if and when Hamas is removed from power, and the Palestinian Authority “reforms” itself to be allowed back into some role of governance, then, and only then, “the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.”

But again, no guarantees. No timelines. No details.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who could join a “peace” committee to govern postwar Gaza under a White House plan, has praised the proposal as the best chance of ending “two years of war, misery and suffering.”

“President Trump has put down a bold and intelligent plan which, if agreed, can end the war, bring immediate relief to Gaza, the chance of a brighter and better future for its people, whilst ensuring Israel’s absolute and enduring security and the release of all hostages,” he said in his first public statement on the issue.

“It offers us the best chance of ending two years of war, misery and suffering and I thank President Trump for his leadership, determination and commitment,” he added.

Under the plan, Trump would chair a so-called Board of Peace that would serve as an oversight committee for local governance.

Trump steering the plan is a “huge signal of support and confidence in the future of Gaza, of the possibility of Israelis and Palestinians finding a path to peace, and of the potential for a broader regional and global alliance to counter the forces of extremism and promote peace and prosperity between nations,” according to Blair.

Netanyahu offered Hamas a take-it-or-leave it approach to a 20-point proposal from Donald Trump that would require Hamas to disarm and give up any role in Gaza’s postwar governance.

Andrew Feinberg has more from the White House:

Trump’s 20-point plan explicitly states that Palestinians will not be “forced to leave” Gaza, walking back Trump’s comments earlier this year stating that the United States will “clean out that whole thing”and “take over” and “own” the besieged strip.

Now, “no one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return,” according to the proposal.

“We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza,” the plan states.