The disarmament of Hamas and all other Palestinian terrorist groups is a precondition for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, the enclave's high representative on the US-led Board of Peace, Nickolay Mladenov, confirmed on Friday.
"Gaza needs to be governed by a transitional authority, as authorised by the Security Council resolution, under which it needs to take on the full civilian and security control of Gaza," Mladenov said during a panel at the Munich Security Conference, referencing US President Trump's peace plan.
"That includes the disarmament of all factions in Gaza, not just Hamas," he stated. "Hamas, Islamic Jihad, others – there are plenty of them who have weapons and tunnels and production facilities inside Gaza."
According to Mladenov, "that is the condition under which we can see Israeli forces withdraw from the current Yellow Line in order to be able to begin any reconstruction for the Gaza Strip".
Mladenov's comments, which came just days before the first meeting of the Board of Peace, closely echoed comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on January 26 following the start of Phase 2 of the US-brokered ceasefire deal.
Jerusalem is "at the threshold of the next phase: Disarming Hamas and demilitarising the Gaza Strip," the premier told Knesset lawmakers at the time, emphasising that "the next phase is not reconstruction".
Netanyahu has repeatedly said that disarmament "will happen – as our friend Trump said – the easy way or the hard way, but it will happen”.
Mladenov on Friday declined to answer questions about the plans for demilitarisation, but stressed that "all of this needs to move very fast".
The main risk is that "we're not going to implement the second phase of the ceasefire, but instead we're going to move to the second phase of the war," he said, calling it "a serious threat to the situation on the ground."
"If Gaza returns to war, there’s no place for the Board of Peace – there's no place for any of us, until we see what is left and potentially pick up the rubble at the end of it," Mladenov warned.
The Bulgarian diplomat said that "if you put the [National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG)] tomorrow in Gaza and the violations of the ceasefire continue the way they are now, we're only embarrassing the committee and ultimately making it ineffective".
Several of Hamas' top leaders, including Khaled Mashaal and Musa Abu Marzouk, have publicly rebuffed key parts of the peace plan in recent weeks, despite having agreed to the deal back in October.
"As long as our people are under occupation,” Mashaal told Al Jazeera last week, "disarmament is an attempt to turn our people into victims, make their elimination easier and facilitate their destruction.
"Questions about the resistance's weapons are being raised forcefully. Some want to place it in the context that whoever carried out October 7 must be cornered and made to pay the price.
"As those who participated in the resistance, we must not accept this," he declared, stating that "resistance is the right of occupied peoples".
Abu Marzouk told the outlet on January 28 that Hamas never agreed to disarm. "Not for a single moment did we talk about surrendering weapons," he said, claiming the issue was never raised in the talks.
Asked about its commitment to cede control of the Strip to the NCAG, which Washington has described as a transitional technocratic body meant to exclude the terror group, Abu Marzouk told Al Jazeera that "nobody can enter Gaza without understandings with Hamas".
"If Hamas doesn't agree to the administrative committee, it cannot enter the Gaza Strip," he stated, claiming to have veto power over its officials.
The 27 member states of the Board of Peace are scheduled to gather in Washington on Thursday for their first meeting aimed at advancing the second phase of the ceasefire deal and raising funds for reconstruction.
Israel will reportedly be represented by Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar.
According to Ynet Trump at the meeting is expected to announce billions of dollars in reconstruction plans, as well as more nations that will provide soldiers for the international force for Gaza.
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