Netanyahu Rejects Trump-Backed Gaza Plan
Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected the US-backed plan to end the war in Gaza, vowing that Israel will not withdraw its forces until Hamas is fully disarmed. The move opens a visible rift with President Trump, who had hailed the fifteen-point “Board of Peace” roadmap as a “historic agreement” for Hamas’s complete disarmament. Hamas had reportedly agreed to the plan, leaving Israel the outlier.
The rejection lays bare how far Mr Netanyahu remains from the deal his most important ally has been promoting, and hands his hardline coalition partners the veto they have demanded. Israeli officials insist that withdrawing before Hamas gives up its weapons would let the group regroup; the plan’s backers argue that endless conditions will kill any chance of peace. American officials were said to view the rejection partly as Israeli domestic politics, with elections looming, and noted that Israel was not currently attacking Gaza. The gap between Washington’s optimism and Mr Netanyahu’s stance is now impossible to paper over. Watch whether Mr Trump pressures Israel or the plan collapses.