A senior Hamas official publicly rejected any deal requiring the terrorist organization to lay down its arms, after Israel said it would support such a deal proposed by the Trump administration.

In response to the Trump deal, Bassem Naim, a Turkey-based senior Hamas official, released a statement on his Telegram channel on Monday calling the proposal a “humiliating surrender document” and not a serious offer to end the war. 

Naim told Middle East Monitor, a pro-Hamas, Qatar-funded site, that the terrorist group would agree to a long-term ceasefire and would release all of the hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, but the Palestinians “right” to weapons and to fight Israel “cannot be relinquished.” He also said the terrorist group would only agree to a full IDF withdrawal from Gaza.

The Trump administration’s deal, according to Israel’s Channel 12, would require Israel to stop its military operation in Gaza City and start a 60-day ceasefire. In the first 48 hours, Hamas would release all 48 remaining hostages, 20 of whom are believed to be alive, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. Then, the sides would negotiate the end to the war.

The proposal does not get into the details of an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, which is supposed to take place gradually as other elements enter to administer the enclave. Israel has said it will maintain a security perimeter around the Gaza Strip, including the Philadelphi Corridor along the border with Egypt.

According to Kan, peace activist Gershon Baskin, at the request of U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Wikoff, passed the offer to Hamas official Ghazi Hamad, with whom he reached the 2011 deal to release captured IDF soldier Gilad Shalit. Baskin told Al-Monitor that the plan includes incentives for Hamas, though he did not specify what they are. 

President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday that “everyone wants the Hostages HOME. Everyone wants this War to end! The Israelis have accepted my Terms. It is time for Hamas to accept them as well. I have warned Hamas about the consequences of not accepting. This is my last warning, there will not be another one!”

A source close to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this week that while Israel is “seriously considering” the proposal, “it seems that Hamas will continue its refusal.” 

A Qatari official briefed media that the country’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani, met with Hamas negotiator Khalil Al-Hayya on Monday and pressed him to “respond positively” to the proposal.

Israel has said its conditions to end the war are “the release of all hostages, Hamas’ disarmament, demilitarization of the [Gaza] strip, Israeli security control of the [Gaza] Strip, the establishment of an alternative civilian government that does not educate to terror, does not promote terror and will not threaten Israel,” as the Prime Minister’s Office stated last week.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz threatened on Monday that “a great hurricane will strike today in the skies of Gaza City and the roofs of the terror towers will shake.”

“This is the last warning to the Hamas murderers and rapists in Gaza and in luxury hotels abroad: Free the hostages and lay down your weapons or Gaza will be destroyed and you will be destroyed,” he wrote on X. 

Hours later, Netanyahu said that the Israeli Air Force bombed 50 “terrorist high-rises” in Gaza City.

“All of this is only the introduction, only the beginning of the main intensive operation, the ground incursion of our forces, that are now getting organized and gathering, into Gaza City,” he added during a visit to Air Force Command. “To the residents of Gaza, listen to me carefully: You have been warned. Get out of there.” 

At the start of Sunday’s cabinet meeting, Netanyahu acknowledged “the price that we are paying in the diplomatic and public diplomacy fields.”

“The best way to get out of this, of course, is to … end the war as fast as possible with the victory that we have defined: Eliminating Hamas, the return of all the hostages and ensuring that Gaza never again threatens Israel,” he said. 

However, he added: “If I need to choose between victory over our enemies and malicious propaganda against us, I choose victory over our enemies.”