Arab mediators have suggested changes to US President Donald Trump's 21-point plan to end the Gaza war, including a two-stage release of hostages and a full Israeli withdrawal from the strip, sources told The National on Sunday.
The sources said the suggested amendments were communicated to US officials last week and that talks between mediators and Washington were continuing.
The suggestions were presented to the US by Egyptian and Qatari mediators after consultations with Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Turkey.
Mr Trump presented the plan last week when he met leaders and officials from Arab and Muslim-majority countries on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, Jordan’s King Abdullah said on Sunday.
Jordan is working with “active partners on the details of a comprehensive plan for Gaza, presented by Mr Trump last week during a multilateral meeting with Arab and Muslim leaders”, a Royal Palace statement quoted the king as saying. He added that “many of its details are in line with what has been agreed upon” among those leaders. The statement did not specify what the plan entails.
The sources on Sunday said the mediators wanted the plan to provide for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and for Hamas to lay down and have its weapons stored under international supervision, rather than surrender them.
Mediators said they had informed US officials it would be difficult to hand over the 48 hostages all at once – 20 are believed to still be alive – because contact with the Hamas operatives guarding the captives has been lost for weeks due to the intensity of the Israeli army's operations in Gaza.
The hostages who died in captivity have been buried inside Hamas's underground tunnels, the sources said, and many of those tunnels have been destroyed. Locating and exhuming the bodies require a great deal of time and effort, they added.
Mr Trump acknowledged on Friday that talks were under way between the stakeholders on his plan.
“Intense negotiations have been going on for four days and will continue for as long as necessary in order to get a successfully completed agreement,” he wrote on Truth Social. “All of the countries within the region are involved.
“Hamas is very much aware of these discussions and Israel has been informed at all levels,” Mr Trump wrote. He called the talks “inspired and productive”.
Steve Witkoff, the US's Middle East special envoy, earlier said Mr Trump had presented to the leaders and senior officials of Arab and Muslim majority nations a 21-point Middle East peace plan.
“We're hopeful, and I might say even confident, that in the coming days we'll be able to announce some sort of breakthrough,” Mr Witkoff said. The plan, he said, “addresses Israeli concerns, as well as the concerns of all the neighbours in the region”.
An official text of the plan has yet to be publicised but sources told The National it includes a long-term ceasefire, the release of all 48 hostages held by Hamas and Israel's gradual withdrawal from Gaza.
It also features a pledge from Mr Trump that Israel would not annex the West Bank and would freeze building new Jewish settlements there. Hamas leaders will leave Gaza to live in exile abroad under the plan.
It makes no mention of Mr Trump's vision, first floated in January, for Gaza's two million Palestinians to leave the enclave that will then be taken over by the US and rebuilt as a glitzy resort.
However, it calls for the reopening of all land crossings into Gaza to allow humanitarian aid into the strip and let the injured out to receive medical care abroad, as well as civilians who wish to leave the territory.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told Fox News on Sunday that Mr Trump's proposal remains in progress as his team works with US officials to secure the release of hostages and dismantle Hamas.
“I hope we can make it a go because we want to free our hostages. We want to get rid of Hamas rule and have them disarmed, Gaza demilitarised, and a new future set up for Gazans and Israelis alike and for the whole region.”
Mr Netanyahu is scheduled to meet Mr Trump in Washington on Monday. Hamas on Sunday said it has yet to receive Mr Trump's proposals but that it was prepared to deal “positively and responsibly” with them.
Egypt, Qatar and the US have been trying for months without success to broker a ceasefire in Gaza and secure the release of the hostages. The last Gaza ceasefire lasted about two months before it collapsed in March.
The first indication that Arab mediators had some reservations on Mr Trump's plan came on Thursday, when Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah El Sisi wrote on social media that the US blueprint serves as a strong foundation that can be built on.
That position was echoed on Saturday by Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty when he addressed the General Assembly in New York.
“Egypt shows readiness and commitment to build on the vision of President Trump to restore stability, end the war, open the horizon for peace, free the hostages and heal all the wounds … to put aside the arrogance of might and raise the banners of construction and hope in tomorrow,” he said.
The Gaza war was caused by a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel in October 7, 2023 in which about 1,200 people were killed and 250 taken hostage. The Israeli army responded with a devastating campaign that has to date killed more than 66,000, authorities in Gaza estimate, and reduced most of the territory to rubble.
The Israeli army's conduct in Gaza has given rise to charges of genocide, including by UN experts, and of the use of starvation as a weapon, leaving most of the enclave's residents without food and creating pockets of famine.
