Senior Hamas leader Mashal again rejects disarmament, 'foreign intervention' in Gaza

Senior Hamas leader Khaled Mashal rejected calls for the terror group to disarm during a speech at the 17th Al-Jazeera Forum in Qatar on Sunday. 

Mashal spoke as a guest at the Al-Jazeera Forum, where he rejected Hamas' disarmament and the deployment of the International Stabilization Force (ISF), as specified in the Gaza Peace Plan proposed by U.S. President Donald Trump. 

The Hamas leader said that calls to surrender weapons are part of what he described as an effort to portray his people as victims.

“As long as our people are under occupation, talk of disarmament is an attempt to turn our people into victims, to make their elimination easier and to facilitate their destruction at the hands of the Israeli side, which is armed with every international means of warfare.” 

“Questions about the resistance’s weapons are being raised forcefully. Some want to place it in the context that whoever carried out Oct. 7 must be cornered and made to pay the price,” Mashal continued.

However, he rejected the argument, saying that “resistance is the right of occupied peoples.” 

“Criminalizing the resistance, its weapons, and those who carried it out is something we should not accept,” Mashal stated. 

His comments reflect Hamas' attempts to portray itself as a “resistance” group opposed to “occupation.” 

“As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation,” Mashal said, adding that nations are proud of resistance groups, which he said are instrumental to their history.

Khaled Meshaal, the head of Hamas abroad, has spoken at the Al Jazeera Forum on the rights of Palestinians to resist occupation. The political leader says the demand of disarmament is unacceptable. pic.twitter.com/TqbH9uc2P7

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 8, 2026

Instead of disarming, Mashal proposed a truce, during which Hamas would not use its weapons. 

“Hamas proposed a truce of five to seven to 10 years,” Mashal said. “This is a guarantee that these weapons are not used.” 

He also rejected “external intervention” in Gaza, an apparent reference to the Gaza Executive Board and the ISF. 

“We adhere to our national principles and reject the logic of guardianship, external intervention, or the return of a mandate in any form,” Mashal said. “Palestinians are to govern Palestinians. Gaza belongs to the people of Gaza and to Palestine. We will not accept foreign rule.” 

Meanwhile, as the U.S. has declared that the second phase of the Gaza Peace Plan has already begun, the situation in the Gaza Strip remains fragile. On Monday morning, the IDF announced that it had killed four Hamas gunmen who emerged from a tunnel in the Rafah area of Gaza, inside the Israeli-controlled territory behind the Yellow Line. 

The military said that four armed terrorists exited an underground tunnel shaft and fired at IDF troops operating in the Rafah area. The four were killed by the IDF during the ensuing firefight, with no reported injuries among Israeli troops.

“IDF troops are continuing to operate in the area to locate and eliminate all the terrorists that are in the underground infrastructure,” the statement read. The terrorists are believed to be part of the group of Hamas fighters who were trapped in the tunnel system in Rafah on the Israeli side of the Yellow Line following the ceasefire agreement in October 2025. 

Israel had reportedly offered the militants the option to surrender to IDF soldiers and relinquish their weapons in exchange for being allowed to live, a condition they declined. Since then, several sporadic incidents have been reported between the remaining militants trapped in the tunnel network and IDF soldiers operating in the Rafah area. It remains unclear how many members of the group are still alive within the tunnels.