Israel has issued a stark warning to Washington regarding the proposed disarmament plan for Hamas, insisting that any further steps in the fragile peace process must be strictly conditional on the militant group’s verifiable compliance. In a clear signal of deep-seated mistrust, senior officials stressed that promises alone will not trigger an Israeli withdrawal from the besieged enclave.
Scepticism over a “paper peace”
The Israeli government has formally communicated its security anxieties to the United States, pushing back against any timeline that does not pivot entirely on the physical surrender of weapons by Hamas.
The intervention comes just days after Donald Trump, the American president, announced that a “Board of Peace” Council had greenlit a framework agreement aimed at dismantling the military capabilities of Hamas and other armed factions in the Gaza Strip. Under the proposed terms, Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) units would begin a phased withdrawal from the territory in tandem with the progress of disarmament.
The condition of “complete disarmament”
However, Jerusalem is drawing a hard line on sequencing. Doron Spielman, a spokesman for the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, articulated the government’s position with uncompromising clarity, arguing that the cessation of military operations cannot precede the total demilitarisation of the group.
“For Israel, the most important thing is that nothing happens until Hamas is completely and genuinely disarmed,” Spielman stated in a briefing with the media. This language suggests that Israel will resist any symbolic gestures or partial handovers as a pretext for advancing diplomatic concessions.
Lingering security fears
Central to Israel’s reluctance is a profound concern over long-term security guarantees. The Netanyahu administration fears that allowing remnants of Hamas’s military infrastructure to survive the current war would inevitably set the stage for a resurgence of hostilities. Israeli military planners are reportedly wary of a scenario where a premature withdrawal, driven by international pressure, would permit the group to rearm and launch fresh attacks shortly after a cessation of hostilities is declared.
The insistence on a reality-based mechanism, rather than a timeline-based schedule, underscores the uphill diplomatic battle ahead to align the American-led peace blueprint with Israel’s stringent demands for a definitive end to Hamas’s armed presence.
