Nickolay Mladenov, the envoy of the US-backed Gaza Board of Peace, says full implementation of its proposal for peace is Israel's sole guarantee against threats to national security.
He remarks came in an interview with Israel's Channel 12 broadcast on Sunday evening, hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the new 15-point proposal and said Israeli troops would not withdraw until Hamas was disarmed.
The plan unveiled by mediators on July 30 lays out steps for the disarmament of Hamas in tandem with Israel's military withdrawal from Gaza. It was described by US President Donald Trump as “historic”.
Mr Mladenov said the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, which prompted Israel's war on Gaza, would “never, ever be allowed to happen, as long as we have a full implementation of the Board of Peace’s plan”.
“The option that we are offering today is the only way that we move forward that guarantees that this tragedy will not occur again,” he added.
Mr Mladenov said the Israeli army is not expected to withdraw from its current positions without a “full decommissioning of all weapons” by Hamas.
He said Israeli forces should not station troops beyond the so-called yellow line and should not shoot at people “unless they are a real threat”. When decommissioning has been verified, Israeli forces are required to retreat “sector by sector” from the yellow line.
“Once each sector is decommissioned, and the weapons are certified – that they have been taken over and stored by the NCAG [National Committee for the Administration of Gaza], the Board of Peace, and rendered unusable – then Israel is required to move back progressively, step by step, in stages.”
None of these plans limits Israel's right to respond to any perceived threat, Mr Mladenov added. If Hamas does not honour its commitments, the process would stop.
When asked about the distrust of Israel meeting its pledges, Mr Mladenov said the peace plan is not based on trust. “I’m not building any of this on the basis of trust, and none of us are, and we’re very clear-eyed about the risks going forward,” he said.
“We’re building it on verification and this is pretty much the basic premise – which I would like both sides to really trust – that because of the verification process, we actually have a chance.”
The plan was announced after months of talks between the Board of Peace, Hamas and mediators from Egypt, Qatar and Turkey on the issue of disarmament, which is viewed widely as one of the difficult parts of the negotiations. Israel has played no part in the disarmament talks but Hamas issued a statement accepting the plan.
Many members of Mr Netanyahu's government reject the idea of withdrawal from Gaza and back the establishment of Israeli settlements in the territory. Mr Netanyahu is meanwhile fighting an election campaign and fears any concessions on Gaza might rile his support base.
This stance could put the Israeli Prime Minister's on a collision course with Mr Trump, who pushed for the ceasefire in Gaza that began last October and who heads the Board of Peace, the body overseeing the implementation of the peace plan.
Channel 12 cited a US official as saying the White House was “not bothered” by Mr Netanyahu's remarks. “We understand his political needs. We have no problem with that, as long as he continues to do what we ask – especially regarding restraining attacks in the strikes in Gaza,” the official reportedly said.
Israel intensified strikes on Gaza in the days after the disarmament plan was announced, drawing criticism from Mr Mladenov and the mediators. The number of Israeli attacks decreased after Mr Mladenov met Mr Netanyahu in Jerusalem last Monday.
