President Donald Trump said Thursday, July 30, that his Board of Peace had reached an agreement for Hamas and other armed groups to disarm in Gaza, with Israeli forces withdrawing as the process advances. But the public accounts from Washington and Hamas immediately exposed a central dispute: which side must move first.
Trump described a carefully phased process. Hamas negotiator Ghazi Hamad, speaking to Al Jazeera and quoted by Axios, said the group would take no disarmament steps before Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip. U.S. and Board of Peace officials instead described reciprocal, independently verified steps in which disarmament and withdrawal would proceed together.
That difference does not necessarily kill the plan, but it means the announcement is not yet the same thing as an implemented settlement. The final withdrawal timetable is still being worked out, Israel has not publicly confirmed the new terms, and the most difficult weapons and tunnel provisions could take months.
What changed
Trump wrote on Truth Social that the Board of Peace had reached what he called a historic agreement for the complete disarmament of Hamas and all other armed groups in Gaza. He said a new Palestinian government would work with the board, while an international stabilization force and a new Palestinian police force would take responsibility for security as Israeli troops leave.
Officials briefing reporters said Hamas's civilian police would first transfer weapons to the new Palestinian police. Heavy weapons would later be decommissioned and secured, tunnels and weapons factories would be dismantled, and other militias in Gaza would also be required to surrender arms.
Axios reported that the process is expected to move area by area over roughly 200 to 250 days. The Associated Press cited a Board of Peace official giving a broader estimate of 200 to 350 days. Those ranges underline how much operational detail remains unsettled.
The sequencing dispute
Hamad's statement places a full Israeli withdrawal ahead of disarmament. Trump's account says Israeli forces will withdraw as disarmament is completed. U.S. officials said neither side would be asked to trust the other: monitors would verify compliance before the process moved from one stage to the next.
Israel was consulted throughout the negotiations, according to U.S. officials, but its government did not immediately announce that it had accepted the new framework. Israel has long demanded complete Hamas disarmament and has questioned whether the group will give up heavy weapons, tunnels and informal control.
What happens next
The first test is whether Hamas, Israel and the mediators publish matching terms. Key questions include the order and geography of Israeli withdrawals, who verifies surrendered weapons, when the technocratic National Committee for the Administration of Gaza enters each area, and what happens if either side fails a checkpoint.
Hamas dissolved its civilian governing body earlier in July and said it was ready to transfer administrative authority to the technocratic committee. That step addressed governance, not the weapons issue now at the center of the talks.
Until signed terms, a verification mechanism and an enforceable timetable are public, the safest reading is that the negotiations have produced a potentially major framework—not a completed disarmament or a finished Israeli withdrawal.
