Secretary of State Marco Rubio met on Sunday Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Jerusalem, where they discussed the insistent proposals of President Trump for the United States to grasp the devastated Gaza band and to force its Palestinian residents, among others.
The trip is of Mr. Rubio First of all in the region As Secretary of State, and comes from uncertainty about if Israel and Hamas can or are ready to transform a tenuous ceasefire in Gaza in a permanent end of their war.
But Mr. Trump’s controversial vision for the transformation of Gaza into a “Middle East riviera” belonging to the United States has overshadowed these negotiations with high issues, and Mr. Rubio is sure to be in a hurry for more clarity On the proposal during his visits to come within the next time in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Mr. Trump was “very daring about what the future of Gaza should be, not the same tired ideas of the past,” said Rubio in remarks prepared on Sunday next to Mr. Netanyahu after the two were met in private. “It may have shocked and surprised a lot, but what cannot continue is the same cycle where we repeat again and again and we find exactly in the same place.”
Rubio also talked about the need to monitor any security threat from the new government in Syria and the imperative to disarm Hezbollah in Lebanon. And he said that Iran is the “common theme of all these challenges”, using a more aggressive language to describe this nation that Mr. Trump generally does by calling it “the greatest source of instability in the region ».
“Behind all terrorist groups, behind each act of violence, behind all the destabilizing activities, behind everything that threatens peace and stability for the millions of people who call this region, is Iran,” said Rubio .
Netanyahu said he thanked Rubio for “the unequivocal support for America for Israel’s policy in Gaza to move forward”. However, Mr. Netanyahu’s government has not yet presented a long -term strategy for Gaza to the Israeli or American public.
“I want to assure all those who listen to us now, President Trump and I are working in full cooperation and coordination between us,” said Netanyahu, who met the president at the White House on February 4.
Trump surprised the world with his Gaza plan at a press conference that day with Mr. Netanyahu, who has since called “a revolutionary and creative approach” which should be studied.
Netanyahu said on Sunday that he and Mr. Rubio had discussed the “daring vision of Trump for Gaza, for the future of Gaza – how we can work together to make sure that this future becomes a reality”. Some Israeli officials consider that the idea is impractical, and experts say it would be a serious violation of international law.
After the Arab officials of the region immediately denounced the proposal, Mr. Rubio had suggested that Mr. Trump was simply trying to “realize” and “move” other nations to provide more aid to Gaza after- war.
Since then, however, Trump has doubled, telling journalists from the oval office twice and in an interview with Fox News that he intended to go ahead with the plan.
The forced expulsion of the Palestinians would be ethnic cleaning and a war crime, say specialists in international law. More than 47,000 Palestinians were killed by Israeli military reprisals in Gaza for an assault led by Hamas in October 2023 which killed 1,200 people. Most of the dead on both sides were civilians.
Trump said Jordan and Egypt should allow Palestinian residents of Gaza to move to their country. The idea has long been promoted by the Israeli right, but categorically rejected by Arab and Palestinian leaders as well as by former American presidents of the two parties. King Abdullah II of Jordan publicly rejected Mr. Trump’s proposal after a Wednesday meeting at the White House to which Rubio also attended.
Rubio said Thursday in an interview on the radio that any Arab proposal for a post-war Gaza should approach the gigantic task of rebuilding the territory and deploying a multinational security force to combat the remains of Hamas.
But this would only be possible once the war in Gaza will end-which depends on the extension of a ceasefire agreement which revolves around the exchanges of hostages and prisoners. The first phase of the current cease-fire agreement should end in March.
Sunday, Mr. Rubio nor Mr. Netanyahu made no reference in their public remarks to the status of negotiations for the next phase of the agreement. Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s special envoy in the Middle East, said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday that talks on phase two of the ceasefire agreement would take place this week.
Later Sunday, Mr. Netanyahu’s office said that the Israeli leader had spoken with Mr. Witkoff and informed him that he would summon the Israel security firm on Monday to discuss the second phase of the agreement.
The indirect negotiations for a permanent cessation of hostilities and the release of all the remaining living hostages of the captivity of Hamas would have started two weeks ago and were to be finalized by the end of this week. Mr. Netanyahu’s spokesperson denied such discussion in progress.
Israel and Hamas both said that the other party had violated the terms of the ceasefire. Sunday, Hamas accused Israel of having violated and shown a lack of commitment to the ceasefire agreement by preventing the entrance to trailers in Gaza to house the displaced Palestinians and delaying talks for the next phase of the agreement.
Israeli officials admitted that they had held the entrance to the housing trailer in Gaza, saying during the weekend that the problem would be discussed in the coming days, without developing on the reasons for delay.
Mr. Trump, on the other hand, seems to have given Mr. Netanyahu a certain room for maneuver for having changed the conditions of the agreement or to resume the fighting in Gaza, if he chooses to do so, saying in social media job On Saturday, the United States will support any decision taken by the Israeli government.
Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Rubio both spoke of the need to eliminate the military and governing capacities of Hamas on Sunday. The Ministry of Israel of Defense announced that an expedition of 2000 pound bombs, which had been retained by the Biden administration, had arrived in Israel over the night. US military officials have said such bombs are not suitable for urban combat, although the Israeli army has abandoned them in Gaza.
The arrival of Mr. Rubio in Israel on Saturday evening came a few hours after Hamas published three Israeli hostages, including a double American citizen, in exchange for 369 Palestinian prisoners. Sunday, Rubio published a written statement saying that Hamas “still has 73 hostages, including the native of New Jersey, Edan Alexander and the remains of four Americans murdered in Gaza. They must all go home now.
Israeli and American governments have been pressure on Hamas for days to release hostages in the hope of maintaining the ceasefire for the first time In mid-January with the push of aids from Biden and Trump. Trump warned last Monday that Israel could cancel the agreement and that “all hell was going to break out” if Hamas did not publish all the hostages by Saturday.
Mr. Rubio is on his second trip as Secretary of State. He landed in Israel after a stop at the Munich security conference and was to go to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Mr. Rubio had planned to stop in Qatar earlier, but it was not on the announced calendar.
In Saudi Arabia, Mr. Rubio and two other Trump aid plan to meet Russian officials to discuss the end of the Russian war in Ukraine.
Michael Crowley contributed Washington’s reports, and Patrick Kingsley Contributed reports of Jerusalem.
