{"id":179045,"date":"2025-10-04T14:54:02","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T14:54:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/179045\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T14:54:02","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T14:54:02","slug":"shock-in-gaza-as-trump-appears-to-welcome-hamas-response-to-us-peace-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/179045\/","title":{"rendered":"Shock in Gaza as Trump appears to welcome Hamas response to US peace plan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">People in Gaza have reacted with shock after US President Donald Trump appeared to welcome Hamas&#8217;s response to his peace plan for the territory. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Hundreds of Palestinians flooded my social media accounts and messaging apps with questions like: &#8220;Has the war ended?&#8221; and &#8220;Is this a dream or reality?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The pace of developments overnight has left many struggling to grasp what comes next.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The movement&#8217;s carefully crafted statement &#8211; thought to have been drafted with the help of mediators &#8211; stopped short of outright rejection and instead offered a qualified &#8220;yes&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Hamas accepted Trump&#8217;s terms for the release of Israeli hostages and the idea of handing over the governance of Gaza to Palestinian technocrats &#8211; but did not give a clear response to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cdxq7zp7002o\" class=\"ssrcss-f6h2dj-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">many other elements of his 20-point proposal<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It was, many Palestinians say, a calculated reply that put the ball back in Israel&#8217;s court.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Soon after it was published, Trump wrote on social media that he believed Hamas was ready for peace and called on Israel to stop the bombing of Gaza. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Reactions among Palestinians in the territory ranged from hope to deep suspicion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Some fear Hamas has walked into a trap, and that Israel will reclaim its hostages only to resume the war. Others believe a historic opportunity has opened to end two years of conflict. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I advise patience,&#8221; Ibrahim Fares told the BBC.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Don&#8217;t get carried away by optimism. There will be rounds of talks over the details. The devil is always in the detail,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Look at Lebanon, where even now there are still displaced people and airstrikes.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Mahmoud Daher noted on Facebook that Hamas&#8217;s response was unusual for its directness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;This time it was yes without the usual &#8216;but&#8217; immediately after,&#8221; he wrote.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Yes to prisoner release under Trump&#8217;s formula, yes to ending the war and withdrawal, yes to handing power to a Palestinian authority. The buts came only later. Hamas even played to Trump&#8217;s ego with praise.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">But not everyone is convinced.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Gaza-based activist and long-time Hamas critic Khalil Abu Shammala said the decision was about the movement&#8217;s survival.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;They will call this wisdom &#8211; or putting the people first. But the truth is, it&#8217;s about Hamas staying in power. I even doubt Hamas wrote the statement &#8211; it was too clever.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">For now, Palestinians remain uncertain as they wait to see whether the words on paper can truly be enough to end the war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People in Gaza have reacted with shock after US President Donald Trump appeared to welcome Hamas&#8217;s response to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-179045","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}