President Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, said Wednesday that it was “good” that Hamas was open to talks with the United States.
Witkoff was asked in an interview with Fox News about comments from Mousa Abu Marzouk, a Hamas official based in Qatar. “We’re prepared for a dialogue with America and achieving understandings on everything,” Abu Marzouk said, according to The New York Times.
In response, Witkoff said, “Well, I think it’s good if it’s accurate. I think we were able to demonstrate that President Trump’s policies, peace through strength, they work. Everybody listens.”
Witkoff’s pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was seen as the key factor in getting Israel to agree to the hostage ceasefire deal, but it’s unclear if the agreement will hold as Israeli officials are threatening to restart military operations after the first phase.
President Trump said on Monday that he was “not confident” that the ceasefire would hold. When asked about these comments, Witkoff acknowledged that the “implementation” of the deal would be more difficult than the “execution.”
Witkoff said he would be traveling to the region, including areas of Gaza controlled by the Israeli military, to monitor the ceasefire. “I’m actually going to be going over to Israel. I’m going to be part of an inspection team at the Netzarim Corridor and also at the Philadelphi Corridor,” he said.
Witkoff, a real estate investor from New York, also said normalization agreements between Israel and Arab states were the key to peace in the region, although similar deals did nothing to resolve the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories.
