Hamas & PA agree on Gaza governance committee, Hamas leader claims

A top Hamas leader, Musa Abu Marzouk, claimed on Tuesday that an agreement with the Palestinian Authority had been reached regarding the responsibilities and the leader of a future committee that would govern Gaza.

Speaking with Al Jazeera, Abu Marzouk didn’t mention whether this agreement had been coordinated with the U.S., which would need to give its green light to make it effective.

Meanwhile, Israel has so far rejected the direct involvement of PA representatives in the governance of Gaza after the war.

Nevertheless, Abu Marzouk said that a PA minister would head the committee, whose responsibilities are to include providing security and supervising border crossings.

According to Arabic media reports, one of the proposed candidates to lead the committee is PA Health Minister Majed Abu Ramadan, who, however, reportedly has already been rejected by Israel.

According to a report by Kan News, Hamas and the PA agreed that Hamas would select about half of the committee members, despite this not being part of the U.S.-backed peace plan.

Hamas has reportedly been trying to install candidates in the committee who are not officially part of the terror group without being its enemy. Another reported potential candidate has been described as “pro-Hamas without being a Hamas member.”

Meanwhile, Channel 12 News reported that Israeli officials “gagged” when they were informed about the Trump administration’s draft for a UN Security Council resolution on establishing the International Stabilization Force (ISF) in Gaza.

Reasons for Israeli skepticism reportedly include the necessity of another partial IDF withdrawal, new limits to the military’s freedom of action in Gaza, as well as the dangerous precedent of introducing an international force into the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.

The news outlet Axios cited a U.S. official saying the Trump administration aims for the first deployment of international troops by the start of next year. Therefore, the administration wants to reach a negotiated agreement on the resolution and vote on it in the coming weeks.

However, the deployment of this force is dependent upon whether Hamas is ready to lay down its arms, as the ceasefire agreement stipulates.

Abu Marzouk refused to answer directly whether his group would fulfill this commitment, arguing that if Hamas is disarmed, “there will be other weapons and other groups. Just as in Iraq, when the Iraqi army was disbanded, chaos followed – al-Qaeda and ISIS emerged.”

Such a move “would not contribute to stability or to the implementation of agreements (such as the ceasefire),” he added.

“There is no vacuum – any replacement force must be Palestinian and agreed upon by Palestinians, so there will be no rejection or internal conflict.”

According to a recent report by Ynet News, internal divisions within Hamas have broken out over the course the terror group should now take.

Abu Marzouk reportedly belongs to the more extreme faction, alongside Khalil al-Hayya, which is advocating the continuation of armed struggle and emphasizing ties with the Iranian regime.