Trump Adviser and BoP to Meet Netanyahu to Discuss Gaza Peace Deal

Ruins in the Gaza Strip, Palestine. (Wikimedia Commons/UN OCHA)

JAKARTA - Senior advisor to US President Donald Trump, Jared Kushner, plans to visit Israel next week with Nickolay Mladenov, the high representative of the Peace Council (BoP) for Gaza, to discuss the continuation of the US plan for the region.

According to Axios, Kushner and Mladenov are scheduled to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a number of officials to discuss the implementation of the next phase of the plan in the coming months.

Earlier on Sunday, Netanyahu rejected the 15-point plan for Gaza that the BoP had approved and Hamas accepted. He stressed that the Palestinian group must be disarmed first before Israel carried out further withdrawals from Gaza.

This attitude was conveyed even though the roadmap issued by the BoP on July 31 stipulates that the disarmament of Hamas and the withdrawal of Israeli forces are carried out simultaneously in stages.

An American official told Axios Washington and Israel have the same strategic goals, but Israel still has some doubts about the plan.

"We see the same strategic goals, but Israel has expressed some doubts about the plan and we want to talk to them to ensure coordination," the official said, quoted by ANTARA from Anadolu, Friday, August 14.

According to the report, the White House does not want the Israeli elections to hinder the implementation of the next phase of the plan for Gaza.

Other US officials said the Trump administration understood Netanyahu's political needs during the process as long as it did not hinder the implementation of agreed policies.

"We don't mind it as long as he continues to do what we ask, especially with regard to holding back the attacks in Gaza," the official said.

Hamas official Ghazi Hamad earlier told Anadolu that the deal regulates "the storage of heavy weapons" under the authority of the National Committee for Gaza Administration, along with the progress of the implementation of other components of the deal.

The road map also includes the transfer of Gaza's administration to a Palestinian technocratic committee, the deployment of an international stabilization force, and the placement of weapons under the authority of a national committee with international supervision.

These steps will be implemented in conjunction with the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces and the reconstruction of Gaza.

Since October 2023, the US-backed Israeli war on Gaza has killed around 73,000 Palestinians and injured more than 174,000 people, most of whom are women and children.

The attack also damaged or destroyed nearly 90 percent of the infrastructure in the Gaza Strip.