{"id":456037,"date":"2026-05-23T10:47:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T10:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/456037\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T10:47:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T10:47:12","slug":"board-of-peace-focus-on-hamas-risks-return-to-war-in-gaza-critics-say-israel-gaza-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/456037\/","title":{"rendered":"Board of Peace focus on Hamas risks return to war in Gaza, critics say | Israel-Gaza war"},"content":{"rendered":"

The top diplomat from the Board of Peace has blamed Hamas for the stalled ceasefire<\/a>, but critics have said the US-backed board\u2019s lack of even-handedness in implementing the truce risks a return to war.<\/p>\n

The \u201chigh representative for Gaza\u201d, Nickolay Mladenov, told the UN security council on Thursday that Hamas<\/a> was the \u201cprincipal obstacle\u201d to the ceasefire\u2019s continued implementation because \u201cit refused to accept verified decommissioning, relinquish coercive control and allow a genuine civilian transition\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nickolay Mladenov. Photograph: Ammar Awad\/Reuters<\/p>\n

Hamas rejected the Bulgarian diplomat\u2019s accusations. Its spokesman, Hazem Qassem, said the report \u201creflects continued adoption of the Israeli position and serves as an attempt to justify further Israeli escalation\u201d.<\/p>\n

Critics of the Board of Peace, launched by Donald Trump<\/a> in January, said the Mladenov report gave a misleading and one-sided account of the ceasefire, in which Israel has been the main violator.<\/p>\n

Israeli forces have continued to carry out airstrikes on Gaza. They have also moved forward from the ceasefire line <\/a>agreed in October, increasing the area under direct Israeli control from the agreed 53% to at least 60%, and have regularly shot at Palestinians who came within a few hundred metres of the shifting line. More than 850 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire was declared in October.<\/p>\n

Palestinians inspecting the rubble of a building in a Gazan refugee camp that was destroyed by an Israeli airstrike on Saturday. Photograph: Abdel Kareem Hana\/AP<\/p>\n

Israel has also fallen short of its obligation to allow in 600 trucks of humanitarian supplies a day, and has refused to relax restrictions on \u201cdual-use\u201d items, which have prevented aid agencies bringing in basic humanitarian supplies, such as water pipes, or heavy machinery to begin clearing rubble.<\/p>\n

Israel was not directly criticised in Mladenov\u2019s report, only by implication in references to \u201call parties\u201d. Critics said that by putting the blame solely on Hamas, Mladenov\u2019s report could lend legitimacy to Benjamin Netanyahu to return to war.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael never fulfilled any of its obligations under phase one of the deal, so why would anyone trust they\u2019d live up to phase two, especially once the weapons (Gaza\u2019s only leverage) are gone?\u201d said Muhammad Shehada, a visiting fellow at the Middle East programme at the European Council on Foreign Relations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they say no, then Netanyahu is going to get a free hand in Gaza and basically be absolved of any obligations under the Trump deal and declare war whenever he wants.\u201d<\/p>\n

Displaced Palestinians receive food from a charity kitchen at the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza Strip this week. Photograph: AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Successive versions of Mladenov\u2019s roadmap were presented to Hamas and other Palestinian factions in March and then April. The April version proposed the creation of an \u201cimplementation verification committee\u201d to oversee the disarmament of Hamas and other armed groups, while ensuring Israel took reciprocal steps.<\/p>\n

The documents said inventory and collection of weapons would be \u201cimplemented gradually in phases\u201d, with \u201cheavy weapons\u201d to be handed in within 90 days, though the definition of \u201cheavy\u201d included assault rifles. The April version of the roadmap said disarmament would be monitored by multilateral bodies, but it added that the \u201cprocess will be under Palestinian leadership\u201d.<\/p>\n

Gershon Baskin, an Israeli analyst who has been involved in past back-channel negotiations with Palestinian groups, welcomed the roadmap, saying: \u201cIsrael and Hamas should agree to it and its implementation should begin immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

However Baskin was critical of Mladenov\u2019s characterisation of the stalemate, putting sole blame on Hamas. He said the militant group had \u201cindicated its willingness to begin the process of disarmament and decommissioning of weapons\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHamas\u2019s demand is that it be done in parallel to the commitments that Israel has undertaken and has not fulfilled,\u201d Baskin added.<\/p>\n

An Israeli military vehicle patrolling the Israeli side of the border with Gaza. Photograph: Amir Cohen\/Reuters<\/p>\n

In his report to the UN, Mladenov accused Hamas of tightening its grip on the 40% of Gaza still under its control. However, Hamas has been calling since February for the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG), a panel of 12 Palestinian technocrats created by the Board of Peace in January, to be allowed into the territory to begin the transfer of power.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Hamas guys inside Gaza are much more pragmatic,\u201d Baskin said. \u201cThey don\u2019t have money, they don\u2019t have the resources, and the people in Gaza don\u2019t want them. And they know that they can\u2019t continue like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Mladenov\u2019s plan, the NCAG is supposed to oversee the disarmament of armed groups in Gaza, however Baskin said Israel had adamantly refused to allow the committee members to enter Gaza from Egypt, where they have become an administration in waiting.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the Israeli insistence that NCAG not go in,\u201d he said. \u201cAmericans have been told by the Israelis that if NCAG is allowed to go in, it will create a situation like Lebanon, where there will be an official government but the real power will be with the guys with guns in the streets.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think that\u2019s the big problem,\u201d Baskin added. \u201cThe big problem is that Israel wants to renew the war, and they\u2019re creating the conditions where the Israeli public is being pumped every day, with the media telling them that Hamas is rebuilding itself, Hamas is gaining strength; that\u2019s a really overblown exaggeration of reality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking at Remembrance Day in Jerusalem last month. Photograph: Ilia Yefimovich\/Reuters<\/p>\n

Daniel Levy, the British-Israeli head of the US\/Middle East Project and former peace negotiator in earlier Israeli-Palestinian talks, said Hamas had not rejected disarmament and the transfer of power.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s well established that they are ready to hand over governance. There\u2019s never been a question about that,\u201d Levy said. \u201cBut they\u2019ve also talked in terms of non-rearmament, non-display of weapons, and [surrendering] heavy weapons. They\u2019ve set out some of these things, but they are not going to wave a white flag of surrender.\u201d<\/p>\n

The limbo has left the Palestinians officials in the NCAG stuck in a hotel in Cairo. They have attended seminars on governance and state-building, and this week they flew to Brussels to meet EU officials, but they have been prevented from talking to the press.<\/p>\n

Shehada said four NCAG members had threatened to resign.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the lack of progress in Gaza, they came to realise that they are a distraction to buy Israel more time,\u201d he said, adding that the four members were persuaded to stay by Mladenov.<\/p>\n

A source close to the NCAG said its members were aware their reputation for integrity was suffering among Palestinians by their association with the Board of Peace, but he said: \u201cThey also know there is no alternative. If there is any hope of stopping the killing in Gaza, this is the only game in town.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The top diplomat from the Board of Peace has blamed Hamas for the stalled ceasefire, but critics have…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456038,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-456037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456037"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456037\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456038"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}