US offered Hamas 10 to 15-year truce as part of unprecedented talks

Question of militant group laying down its arms is under discussion, as well as the release of all hostages

Adam Boehler, US envoy for hostages, says a deal to free hostages held by Hamas in Gaza could be reached 'within weeks'. AFP

Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza

US envoy for hostages Adam Boehler has offered Hamas a conditional 10 to 15-year truce in Gaza as part of wide-ranging discussions between the two sides on the future of both the war-battered enclave and the militant group, sources told The National on Monday.

They said Hamas has welcomed the offer in principle, but detailed talks on conditions set by the US are yet to take place. The two sides are planning to meet again soon, either in Egypt or Qatar, the sources said.

Hamas has also requested that the reconstruction of Gaza is carried out while the enclave's residents remain and that they not be resettled in Egypt and Jordan, as suggested by US President Donald Trump who says he wants to take over the territory and turn it into a glitzy beach resort.

A well-placed Hamas source reached by The National declined to confirm or deny the truce offer. "Many points were discussed, and the Americans listened to Hamas's vision, and the main goal was to see what Hamas wanted, basically," said the source. Hamas was represented in the talks by senior officials Mohammed Darwish, Khalil Al Hayya and Zaher Jabareen.

A US State Department representative said efforts to bring home the hostages held in Gaza are "ongoing and sensitive" but declined to give more detail. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday said Mr Boehler's meetings were a "one-off situation", which had not "borne fruit"

"Doesn't mean he was wrong to try, but our primary vehicle for negotiations on this front will continue to be [special envoy for the Middle East, Steve] Witkoff and the work he's doing through Qatar," Mr Rubio said.

The discussions between Mr Boehler and Hamas broke with a decades-old policy by Washington against negotiating with groups the U.S. brands as terrorist organizations.

Palestinian children wait to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen in Khan Younis, southern Gaza. Reuters

The sources said Hamas was responsive to most US conditions, including the release of what the Israeli military believes to be 24 living hostages and the remains of 35 others. It was also willing to relinquish its 18-year rule of Gaza, not interfere in the strip's reconstruction and integrate with other factions under the umbrella of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

Hamas has consistently rejected calls to lay down its weapons, claiming armed resistance was a legitimate right in the face of Israeli occupation. However, the discussions between the group's top officials and Mr Boehler touched on the possibility of Hamas dismantling its arsenal of rockets and other heavy weapons if an independent Palestinian state is established in the currently Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza, said the sources. In that case, they explained, Hamas will keep only weapons that do not pose a threat to Israel.

The sources said the US-Hamas discussions – at least three rounds of which have been held since the start of the year at a suburban hotel in Qatar's capital Doha – also covered areas such as the fate of the elaborate network of underground tunnels built by Hamas's military wing in Gaza, as well as the reconstruction of the enclave and the socioeconomic conditions of its 2.3 million people.

A Palestinian man uses a fridge door as a makeshift raft to fish at the port of Gaza city. AFP

The sources said the discussions, which were initiated by the US, lasted several hours each time the two sides met and were conducted in an atmosphere of positivity.

"The two sides patiently listened to each other and now they are talking about prioritising what should be done," said one of the sources. "It's a historic moment for Hamas, which pounced on the US offer to meet and it's taking the process very seriously. It's something that Hamas had dreamt of for years – the chance to directly present itself and speak to the Americans."

The Hamas source who spoke to The National agreed. "The meetings produced an American recognition of Hamas's strength in the Palestinian arena, that it is a major and important player that cannot be uprooted," he said.

Mr Boehler told CNN the meetings with Hamas had been "very helpful" and that he was confident a deal to free hostages held by Hamas could be reached "within weeks". He said he did not rule out further meetings with the Palestinian militants.

He said he understood Israel's "consternation" that the US had held talks at all with the group but said he had been seeking to reignite the "fragile" negotiations.

"In the end, I think it was a very helpful meeting," Mr Boehler said. "I think something could come together within weeks ... I think there is a deal where they can get all of the prisoners out, not just the Americans."

A Palestinian family break their fast during Ramadan amid the rubble of their home, bombed by the Israeli army, in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza. EPA

The sources speaking to The National on Monday said Mr Boehler has instantly endeared himself to the Hamas officials when he and members of his team raised questions about the legitimacy of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's claim to office nearly 20 years after he was elected to a four-year term.

Hamas and the PA, which is based in the West Bank, have been at odds since the militant group threw the main Palestinian Fatah faction out of Gaza in a brief civil war in 2007. A number of bids to reconcile them have since failed.

The US-Hamas negotiations follow the expiry on March 1 of a 42-day ceasefire in Gaza brokered by US, Egyptian and Qatari mediators over a year of tortuous, on-and-off negotiations. It took effect on January 19 to pause the Gaza war after 15 months of fighting and featured the release of 33 hostages – 25 living and the remains of eight others – who had been held by Hamas, in exchange for about 2,000 Palestinians incarcerated in Israel.

As part of that agreement, Israel and Hamas should have started talks on the second phase of the deal in early February but never did. Instead, Israel offered an extension of the first phase until mid-April and pressed Hamas to release half of the remaining hostages in return for a promise to negotiate a lasting truce. Hamas has rejected the offer, insisting on a transition to negotiations on the second phase.

The war was sparked by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and about 250 taken back to Gaza as hostages. Israel's military response has killed about 48,500 Palestinians, Gaza's Health Ministry says. It has also reduced most of the sector's built-up areas to rubble and displaced the vast majority of its 2.3 million residents.