“The proposed weapons handover is out of the question and not negotiable,” the official said.
The US president has indicated the issue of Hamas surrendering its weapons would be addressed in the second phase of the peace plan.
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The 20-point plan promises amnesty to Hamas members who decommission their weapons and says they will be allowed to leave Gaza.
The Hamas official was speaking as a ceasefire holds in Gaza ahead of Monday’s 72-hour deadline for the release of Israeli hostages held since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attacks.
Hamas’s disarmament and the pullback of Israeli forces are seen as key sticking points for Trump’s plan despite rising hopes for the end of two years of devastating war.
On October 1, Hamas officials said they wanted amendments to clauses in U.S. President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, including those related to disarmament.
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Hamas negotiators, during talks with Turkish, Egyptian, and Qatari officials in Doha, conveyed their conditions a day before issuing the statement.
Trump’s plan called for the group’s disarmament and a gradual Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. But Hamas sources said they sought to amend the clauses on disarmament and the expulsion of Hamas and faction members.
Hamas also said it wanted “international guarantees for a full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip” and assurances that no assassination attempts would be made inside or outside the territory.