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3. Hamas Proposes Weapons 'Freeze' in Return for Long-Term Truce

A top Hamas leader told Qatari news channel Al Jazeera on Wednesday that the militant group is open to a weapons "freeze" but rejects the demand for disarmament put forward in the US-sponsored peace plan for Gaza.

"The idea of total disarmament is unacceptable to the resistance (Hamas). What is being proposed is a freeze, or storage (of weapons)... to provide guarantees against any military escalation from Gaza with the Israeli occupation," said Khaled Meshaal in an interview aired Wednesday.

"This is the idea we're discussing with the mediators, and I believe that with pragmatic American thinking... such a vision could be agreed upon with the US administration," he said.

The US-sponsored ceasefire deal, in effect since October 10, halted the war that began after Hamas's deadly attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. But it remains fragile, as Israel and Hamas accuse each other almost daily of breaches.

The agreement is composed of three phases. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently indicated that it was about to enter the second phase.

Under that phase Israeli troops would further withdraw from their positions in Gaza and be replaced by an international stabilization force (ISF), while Hamas would lay down its weapons.

Netanyahu is expected to meet with US President Donald Trump in the US later this month to discuss the steps forward in the truce.

But the Palestinian militant group has indicated it would not agree to giving up its arsenal.

"Disarmament for a Palestinian means stripping away his very soul. Let's achieve that goal another way," Meshaal added.

In the first phase of the deal, Palestinian militants committed to releasing the remaining 48 living and dead captives held in the territory. All of the hostages have so far been released except for one body.

In exchange, Israel has released nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners in its custody and returned the bodies of hundreds of dead Palestinians.

As for the international peacekeeping force, Meshaal said the group was open to its deployment along Gaza's border with Israel but would not agree to it operating inside the Palestinian territory, calling such a plan an "occupation."

"We have no objection to international forces or international stabilization forces being deployed along the border, like UNIFIL," he said, referring to the UN peacekeeping force deployed in southern Lebanon near the Israeli border.

"They would separate Gaza from the occupation," he added, referring to Israel.

"As for the presence of international forces inside Gaza, in Palestinian culture and consciousness, that means an occupying force."

Mediators, as well as Arab and Islamic nations, he said, could act as "guarantors" that there would be no escalation originating from inside Gaza.

"The danger comes from the Zionist entity, not from Gaza," he added, referring to Israel.

AFP