Al Jazeera reported Friday that Hamas delivered its response to President Donald Trump’s peace plan, hours after the president gave the terror group a deadline of 6:00 p.m. ET on Sunday or else face total destruction.
Al Jazeera reported:
The Palestinian group says that, in order to end Israel’s war on Gaza and a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from the enclave, it is ready to release all Israeli captives – both those who are living and dead – according to the exchange plan outlined in Trump’s proposal.
“In this context, the movement affirms its readiness to immediately enter into negotiations through the mediators to discuss the details of this agreement,” Hamas said in a statement shared on Telegram.
It also said it agrees to hand over the administration of Gaza to an independent body of Palestinian technocrats, “based on Palestinian national consensus and Arab and Islamic support”.
The response did not, apparently, include an agreement to disarm — a core Israeli and American demand.
However, the prospect of releasing all of the hostages, if real, would create real pressure for a compromise.
It is possible that a deal could be struck on or around the second anniversary of the Hamas terror attack of October 7, 2023, that began the war. That attack also occurred on the last day of the seven days of the Jewish holiday of Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles); this year, October 7 again coincides with Sukkot, on the first day.
Trump’s ultimatum did not specify whether Hamas needed to agree in full to all 20 points in the deal.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Zionist Conspiracy Wants You, now available on Amazon. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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