Netanyahu says Israel ‘didn’t agree’ to Board of Peace’s plan to disarm Hamas

In his first public comments on the matter, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israel has not agreed to the Board of Peace’s disarmament plan, which was accepted by Hamas last week.

Reiterating comments from recent days attributed to “senior Israeli officials,” Netanyahu said in a video posted to Facebook that Israel will not withdraw “from our current lines” in Gaza “until Hamas is completely disarmed.”

This would appear to go against the disarmament plan, which requires Israel to pull back to the original Yellow Line in Gaza. Israel withdrew to that line as part of the October 2025 ceasefire-hostage release deal with Hamas, but has since expanded its control of the Strip from 53 percent to over 60%.

While the Board of Peace indicated that Israel would not have to carry out withdrawals beyond the original Yellow Line until Hamas at least begins to hand over its weapons, Netanyahu asserted that Israeli forces will not move at all, as his election campaign kicks into gear.

“[US] President [Donald] Trump thinks — or his team thinks — that they can get Hamas to disarm and demilitarize Gaza. We are looking into it. They sent us a draft. We did not agree to it. It was not our draft. We sent back our comments,” Netanyahu said in the video statement.

The “draft” Netanyahu described was not supposed to be open for debate with Israel, as it was the result of separate negotiations between Hamas, the Trump-controlled Board of Peace and mediating countries Egypt, Qatar, Turkey and the US.

A senior US official briefing reporters last week said the disarmament proposal is an extension of Trump’s 20-point plan for ending the Gaza war, which Israel already accepted last fall. Accordingly, Israel is only being asked to maintain its adherence to the 20-point plan, the US official said, adding that Trump would be “very disappointed” in Jerusalem if it blocked the proposal’s advancement.

However, with Israel seemingly opposed to the proposal, the Board of Peace’s top envoys visited Jerusalem to meet with Netanyahu on Monday in a bid to bring him on board.

That effort did not appear to bear fruit, though, as the Board of Peace subsequently indicated that it may reopen the terms of the deal for deliberation, issuing a statement that suggested it was changing the terms of the Israeli withdrawal in Jerusalem’s favor.

But agreeing to Israel’s demands to amend the disarmament proposal risks losing the support of Hamas, which took months to secure.

Along with a withdrawal to the original Yellow Line, the plan requires Israel to immediately halt all military operations in Gaza once it enters into force. While Israel has pushed back on this condition, it did reportedly agree to tighten the rules of engagement in Gaza, requiring the approval of the IDF chief of staff before any single strike can go ahead.

Netanyahu did not deny that policy change in his video statement, but insisted, “We are instructing IDF soldiers to do whatever is necessary to defend themselves, defend our territory and defend people.”