Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a call with coalition party chiefs on Monday, reportedly trying to assure them that Israel wasn’t going to agree to end the war before Hamas is defeated after he agreed to a request from the Trump administration to send a negotiating team to Doha in order to jumpstart long-stalled hostage negotiations with the terror group.
Netanyahu agreed to the US request after meeting with US special envoy to the Mideast Steve Witkoff and holding a brief phone call with US President Donald Trump after Hamas released American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander after he spent 584 days in captivity. Hamas released Alexander in what has been characterized as a gesture of goodwill to Trump after the group received assurances from a third-party mediator that the step would go a long way with Washington, opening the door to the administration potentially coaxing Israel to end the war in Gaza.
But Netanyahu told coalition partners that he won’t budge from his refusal to end the war before Hamas’s military and governing capabilities have been dismantled, according to multiple Hebrew media reports.
This could put him at odds with not just Hamas, but also the United States, whose officials for the first time in months are employing rhetoric about “ending the war” in Gaza, as Israel threatens to massively expand its military operations in order to re-occupy the entire Strip.
Trump characterized Hamas’s decision to release Alexander as a “step taken in good faith towards the United States and the efforts of the mediators… to put an end to this very brutal war and return ALL living hostages and remains to their loved ones.”
His ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee expressed the administration’s hope that Alexander’s release “marks the beginning of the end to this terrible war,” which was sparked over 19 months ago by Hamas when its fighters invaded Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking 253 hostage. Fifty-eight people are still being held in Gaza — at least 23 of whom are believed to be alive.
Staff Sgt. Edan Alexander is airlifted along with his family from the Re’im base in southern Israel to Sourasky Hospital in Tel Aviv, May 12, 2025. (Israel Defense Forces)
Over 52,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the Gaza war, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures have not been credibly verified and don’t differentiate between civilians and combatants. On March 2, Israel began blocking humanitarian aid from entering Gaza, arguing that enough had gone in during a six-week ceasefire and asserting that Hamas has been stealing that assistance from civilians. But even IDF officials have acknowledged privately in recent weeks that the Strip is on the brink of starvation, and an Israeli plan to resume assistance faces mounting obstacles.
While repeated polls have indicated that a clear majority of Israelis backs ending the war in exchange for the hostages, Netanyahu has rejected this trade, arguing that it would leave Hamas in power. His far-right coalition partners have also threatened to collapse his government if he were to approve such an exchange.
All of this raises the stakes as an Israeli delegation takes off for Doha on Tuesday for another round of indirect talks with Hamas co-mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the US. The Israeli officials Netanyahu is sending to Doha are his diplomatic adviser Ophir Falk, the government’s hostage point man Gal Hirsch and a former Shin Bet deputy chief — whose name is barred from publication.
Trump will also arrive in the region on Tuesday, starting in Saudi Arabia before continuing to Qatar and then the United Arab Emirates — with the Gaza war likely to come up during his meetings with Gulf leaders, even if the issue is not expected to dominate a trip largely focusing on US economic interests in the region.
Israel has threatened to launch its major military operation in Gaza once Trump leaves the Mideast on Friday if Hamas doesn’t agree to a hostage deal by then.
Netanyahu told coalition partners that despite sending a negotiating team to Doha, his position hasn’t changed. The negotiators only have a mandate to discuss what the premier has referred to as the “Witkoff proposal,” which would see as many as half of the hostages released in exchange for a weekslong ceasefire. During that truce, Israel is prepared to hold talks regarding a permanent end to the war, but will accept nothing less than Hamas agreeing to disarm and give up governing control of Gaza.
Hamas has said it is prepared to cede control of the Strip and agree to a yearslong truce with Israel that includes security guarantees. However, it has long refused demands that it permanently disarm.
It has also demanded guarantees from the mediators — potentially in the form of a binding UN Security Council resolution — that Israel be prevented from resuming the war if Hamas agrees to release hostages. Arab mediators say they face an uphill battle convincing Hamas to release hostages without assurances that Israel will end the war because the previous deal was supposed to see the sides enter talks regarding the terms of a permanent ceasefire, but Netanyahu largely refused to do so and the truce collapsed after its first of three phases.
Netanyahu, in his Monday call with coalition heads, said Israel would not accept any guarantees that it end the war absent the complete dismantlement of Hamas.
Freed hostage Edan Alexander with a representative of the Red Cross, flanked by Hamas gunmen in the Gaza Strip on May 12, 2025. (via Al Jazeera)
The US has backed this goal in the past, and Arab stakeholders are principally supportive, but they have argued that it will be a gradual process that requires Israel allowing for a viable alternative to be stood up in Gaza, with the foundation being a reformed Palestinian Authority. Netanyahu has refused to grant the PA a significant foothold in Gaza. The stance has stopped nearly half a dozen Arab countries from taking part in the post-war management of the Strip, given that they’ve conditioned their support on the establishment of a political horizon for an eventual two-state solution.
Amid the lack of alternatives to Hamas, the war in Gaza has dragged on, as Hamas has managed to continue recruiting fighters, frequently returning to areas briefly cleared by the IDF. After asserting during the war’s initial months that Israel did not seek to re-occupy Gaza, such a result is seen as increasingly likely, and Netanyahu and his coalition partners are now openly framing it as their goal.
In a meeting with wounded IDF soldiers on Monday evening, Netanyahu said that “within days, things are going to happen in Gaza… that you have never seen before until now,” according to Hebrew media reports.
The meeting was held with the hawkish forum “Wounded Soldiers for Victory,” which was established about two weeks ago with the aim of promoting the “destruction of Hamas,” according to a Ynet report.
In the hour-and-a-half-long meeting, Netanyahu listened to the soldiers’ accounts of their combat injuries and said to them that, while he is “giving a chance” for the return of the hostages, if these efforts do not succeed, the fighting will be intense and “to the end,” says Ynet.
Netanyahu was also quoted as having said that Israel will “occupy” Gaza and will take over security control over Gaza “forever.”
Last week, Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel claimed on CNN that those calling for Israel to occupy Gaza are part of a fringe and don’t represent the position of the Israeli government.
Far-right MK urges Netanyahu to have US Jews settle Gaza
During closed-door testimony before the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Tuesday, Netanyahu said that Israel is “destroying more and more houses [in Gaza and Palestinians accordingly] have nowhere to return,” according to quotes leaked to the Maariv daily.
“The only obvious result will be Gazans choosing to emigrate outside of the Strip,” Netanyahu continued. “But our main problem is finding countries to take them in.”
Netanyahu told the lawmakers that he had recently discussed Trump’s plan for the US to take over Gaza with the president but acknowledged that there have been difficulties in implementing it.
While Trump initially called on Egypt and Jordan to take in Palestinians, both countries quickly pushed back against the idea, insisting that Palestinians should be allowed to remain on their land.
Israel has also refrained from publicly assuring Gazans that those who leave will be allowed to return, further reducing the incentive for countries to take in Gazans, given the perception that they’d be interfering in a decades-old land conflict.
Dozens who have left Gaza as part of a pilot program offering them work abroad were reportedly required to sign documents upon departure acknowledging that there is no timeline for when they can come back due to the security situation. Children who have been evacuated for medical treatment abroad have also been prevented by Israel from reuniting with their families back in Gaza after the completion of their hospital stay.
Palestinians sift through debris following an Israeli strike in the Bureij refugee camp in the center of the Gaza Strip, May 7, 2025. (Eyad BABA / AFP)
During Sunday’s Knesset committee meeting, Netanyahu claimed that despite the lack of success in finding countries to take in Gazans, the US is still interested in taking over Gaza.
Sources familiar with the matter have told The Times of Israel, however, that the Trump administration has put minimal effort into actually advancing Trump’s Gaza takeover plan, following the massive pushback it received from Arab allies since it was announced in early February.
Still, Netanyahu told the lawmakers. “I know I will disappoint some people here, but we are not talking about Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip right now.”
MK Limor Son Har-Melech replied, “Bring the Jews of the United States (to settle Gaza). That way, we can kill two birds with one stone,” according to Maariv.
Palestinians try to receive a hot meal prepared by volunteers in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, May 6, 2025. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)
Netanyahu also briefed the committee on Israel’s plan to soon resume the distribution of aid in Gaza through a new system that aims to prevent assistance from being diverted by Hamas.
Netanyahu said that those who pick up aid from newly established distribution hubs in southern Gaza will be barred from returning to places in Gaza outside of the new humanitarian zone being set up in southern Gaza. Israel’s aid plan envisions squeezing Gaza’s entire population of 2 million people into an area in and surrounding Rafah that makes up between 10 and 25 percent of the Strip. Those entering will be vetted by the IDF, according to officials briefed on the plan.
A new organization called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation was established in order to manage the new aid program. GHF was supposed to announce its rollout last week, but has faced major setbacks after the UAE, the UN and other international bodies refused to cooperate or fund the initiative due to concerns that it doesn’t adequately address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where aid has been banned by Israel since March 2.
