In a report updated early this morning, Oct. 21, the New York Times indicated that the White House, including U.S. President Donald Trump, is worried that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may scupper the Gaza peace deal. Several unnamed Trump officials said there is concern within the administration that Netanyahu may vacate the deal. The strategy now, the officials say, is for Vice President J.D. Vance, White House envoy Steve Witkoff, and Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, to try to keep Netanyahu from resuming an all-out assault against Hamas.
For now, the President believes that Hamas leaders are willing to continue negotiations in good faith and that the attack on Israeli soldiers was carried out by a fringe element of the group, according to a White House official who spoke privately to convey the President’s thinking, the New York Times report continues. Indeed, Trump has bucked Israeli declarations that Hamas had violated the agreement. On Oct. 20, he characterized the current fighting in Gaza as a “rebellion” in Hamas that was not representative of the organization’s leadership. He said that some Hamas fighters “got very rambunctious,” but that if the violence continued, the United States would permit Israel to violently eliminate the organization.
Late on Oct. 20, Hamas leader Khalil Al-Hayya issued a statement reiterating Hamas’s commitment to the Sharm el-Sheikh agreement. “We are committed to the ceasefire agreement and what was agreed upon with the Palestinian factions,” he said. “We are fully confident and determined to implement the Gaza agreement completely, and that it will hold based on the promises made and heard from all mediators.
“We are serious about extracting and handing over all the bodies as stipulated in the agreement,” Al-Hayya added. Overnight, Hamas turned over another body, leaving 15 remaining to be recovered.
“What we heard from the mediators and the U.S. President reassures us that the war in Gaza has ended,” Al-Hayya said. “The major international demonstration and the U.S. President confirmed that the war in Gaza has ended.”
