WashingtonPresident Donald Trump has accepted Hamas's response and ordered Israel to "stop bombing Gaza immediately, so we can get the hostages out safely and quickly." The president announced this in a post on Truth Social on Friday afternoon. "We continue to discuss the details to make this work. This is not just about Gaza, it's about lasting peace in the Middle East." Trump has accepted Hamas's response about releasing the hostages, and also plans to discuss other aspects of the plan with which he does not fully agree.
The Republican's reaction comes shortly after Hamas's response to the peace plan presented with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday. In a statement sent to mediators, the Islamist group agreed to release all Israeli hostages in accordance with the American's draft and appeared willing to discuss other details of the document. "The movement affirms its willingness to immediately sit down to negotiate through mediators to discuss the details of the agreement," says the statement, which was also shared by Trump in another post.
In the text, Hamas also says it agrees to hand over the administration of Gaza to an independent body of Palestinian technocrats, "based on the Palestinian national consensus and Arab and Islamic support." Washington's plan calls for a transitional government, the "Peace Board," which would be led by several members and heads of state, including former Prime Minister Tony Blair, although Trump himself would be in charge of the institution.
The armed group has indicated that "other issues mentioned in President Trump's proposal regarding the future of the Gaza Strip and the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people are linked to a unified national position and relevant international laws and resolutions." All of these, according to the group, "will be addressed through a comprehensive Palestinian national framework, in which Hamas will participate and contribute responsibly." With this response, the organization is asking for a seat at the negotiating table amid the attempt by Israel and the United States to impose a pact that has left it out of the talks.
This Friday morning, Trump had presented an ultimatum to Hamas to accept his peace plan, setting a deadline: Sunday at 6 p.m. in Washington, midnight in Catalonia. If not, he warned, "hell will break loose like never before" against the Palestinian Islamist group.
"An agreement must be reached with Hamas by Sunday night at 6 p.m. Washington, DC time. All countries have signed! If this agreement, which is a last chance, is not reached, all hell will be unleashed on Hamas like never before. peace. Trump once again displays his doctrine regarding how to end conflicts: "Peace through strength."
While the back-and-forth negotiations continue, the war rages cruelly in Gaza. This week, in which the media spotlight has focused on the Trump-Netanyahu plan and later on the Flotilla, the Israeli army has continued to insistently bomb the Strip, especially Gaza City, where the assault to conquer the town is still ongoing. On Friday morning alone, Israel had killed at least 35 Palestinians according to figures from the authorities in the Strip, controlled by Hamas.
In the post, the US president claimed that more than 25,000 Hamas "soldiers" have been killed in the Israeli offensive. "Most of those left are surrounded and MILITARY TRAPPED, waiting for me to say the word 'ANEM' so their lives can be quickly extinguished. As for the rest, we know where they are and who they are, and they will be located and killed."
Trump also indirectly threatened all Palestinians: "I demand that all innocent Palestinians immediately leave this area—which could be the scene of great disaster in the future—and move to safer parts of Gaza." The Gaza peace plan agreed upon with Netanyahu promised no forced displacement of Palestinians, but now the Republican is telling Gazans to leave an unspecified area of the Strip for safer areas or they will suffer the "hell" he plans to unleash on Hamas. In the post, he also demands the return of all hostages still in the Strip.
According to anonymous sources in various media outlets, Hamas has asked for "more time" to study the proposal. But now there is a deadline. So far, Hamas has limited itself to indicating from Qatar that is examining the proposal, which offers few guarantees and only includes a 72-hour deadline for the exchange of Israeli hostages still held in Gaza and Palestinian prisoners in Israel. The organization demanded that the plan include concrete deadlines for the Israeli withdrawal and hopes to include other changes, such as the possibility of keeping part of its arsenals.
Trump and Netanyahu agreed on a plan to end the war in Gaza without the Islamist group, putting full pressure on Hamas from the beginning to accept it, understanding that if it does not, the United States will give "full support" so that Israel can "finish the job" in the Strip. Instead of an olive branch, the American president is holding a gun pointed at a Palestinian population tired of burying their relatives after almost two years of war. The genocidal war perpetrated by Tel Aviv has killed more than 66,000 Palestinians, while subjecting the rest of the inhabitants of the Strip to constant bombing and hunger.
International support
The president emphasized how his peace proposal has the support of "very wealthy nations in the Middle East, the surrounding areas, and beyond," referring to Arab and Muslim countries, including Qatar and Saudi Arabia. In fact, much of the international community, including Arab countries, support the two leaders' plan as a first step toward a definitive ceasefire.
The plan to end the war calls for a reform of the Palestinian Authority and only proposes the withdrawal of Israeli troops as Gaza comes under the control of new security forces that Washington will create in collaboration with Arab and international partners. Furthermore, the Strip will eventually become a sort of US protectorate, with the transitional administration headed by Trump himself.
The transitional administration proposed by Trump is not so different from the announcement he made at the press conference seven months ago with Netanyahu, where he already hinted at the idea that the United States would "take over" the Gaza Strip. The international community was outraged, but now it seems they have accepted it as completely normal.
59% of the US population is against the Netanyahu government.
Fifty-nine percent of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of the Israeli government nearly two years after the start of its offensive in Gaza, while 42 percent disapprove of US President Donald Trump's response to the conflict, according to a survey released Friday by the Pew Research Center. The survey, conducted among 3,445 adults between September 22 and 28, shows rising discontent among the US population with the handling of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which stood at 51 percent at the beginning of 2024. Thirty-nine percent believe Israel is going too far in its war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, where more than 66,000 Palestinians—mostly women and children—have already died, millions have been displaced, and the humanitarian crisis is of catastrophic proportions.
The data from this new Pew Center survey stands in stark contrast to those collected by the organization itself following the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023, which left 1,200 dead and 251 kidnapped, triggering the current war in the enclave. At that time, only 27% considered the Israeli response to the Hamas attack to be excessive, a figure that rose to 31% a year later.
![A Palestinian with his belongings amid the ruins of Gaza City.](data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 16 9"%3E%3C/svg%3E)
