Kushner in Israel, trying to get Gaza peace plan back on track
The Hill · C · trust 53/100
Comments: by Laura Kelly - 08/17/26 12:30 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Laura Kelly - 08/17/26 12:30 PM ET Comments: Link copied NOW PLAYING Special envoy Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, an Israeli official told The Hill, following reported talks with the U.S.-designated terrorist group Hamas about moving forward with President Trump’s peace plan for the Gaza Strip.
The meeting lasted four hours, CNN reported, with Kushner pressing Netanyahu to “not create obstacles” in moving to the next stage of the peace plan. Netanyahu last week rejected a 15-point roadmap for Hamas to disarm and Israel to withdraw from Gaza, saying Israel is not prepared to withdraw before Hamas gives up its weapons.
Kushner, who is Trump’s son-in-law, was joined in Israel by Nickolay Mladenov, the top representative for the Board of Peace, the entity Trump established to carry out the peace plan for Gaza.
Netanyahu’s office released a statement saying he and the Board of Peace “had deep and constructive discussions” and agreed to set up two working groups, one on disarmament and demilitarization of Gaza and a second focusing on sanitation, clean water and other public health issues in the Gaza Strip.
The prime minister’s office said Israel and the Board of Peace determined the working group on disarmament “should be prompt and completed before any reconstruction happens in Gaza.”
The Hill reached out to the Board of Peace and Hamas for comment.
Kushner’s meetings in Israel followed a reported two-hour meeting with Hamas’s new chief, Khalil al-Hayya, in Cairo, alongside mediators from Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, The Associated Press reported. Hamas initially accepted the 15-point plan when it was announced late last month, though Hamas called for Israel to halt attacks on the territory and withdraw at the same time it hands over weapons.
Kushner pressed Hamas for tangible steps to disarmament, Axios reported, including transferring governing authority to the Palestinian technocratic government and ensuring Hamas has no role in Gaza’s future governance.
But Kushner also thanked al-Hayya for the group’s commitment to the plan and efforts to recover the bodies of all killed Israelis, according to Axios.
Hamas leaders thanked the U.S. for efforts to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza. Despite a ceasefire in November, Gaza’s nearly 2 million people are suffering a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. UNRWA, the U.N. agency responsible for Palestinian refugees, said it is hosting about 65,000 internally displaced people, but nearly the entire population lacks basic shelter, sufficient water, food or medical care.
Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants, has recorded more than 70,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 174,000 have been injured throughout the nearly three-year war, with an additional 1,200 Palestinians killed and more than 4,300 injured since the ceasefire went into effect.
The Trump administration faces an uphill battle in getting Netanyahu to meaningfully commit to the peace plan for Gaza ahead of hotly contested Israeli elections set for late October and the anniversary of Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
On that day, Hamas killed an estimated 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 people hostage. About 160 people were returned to Israel through negotiations, exchanges and rescue operations over the two-year period. Trump’s ceasefire deal in October saw the remaining 20 living hostages released and the bodies of the deceased hostages returned to Israel in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners.
“October 7 is the day for the Israelis to make promises that they will never see anything like that again, and the trauma is very much strong and alive,” said Tal Schneider, an Israeli journalist specializing in diplomacy and politics, in a panel hosted by the Jerusalem Press Club on Monday.
“There’s a very, very strong sentiment in all walks of Israeli society not to surrender anything to the terrorists. It’s so strong that Netanyahu can hardly do anything at the moment.”
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