The Israeli prime minister met with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Israel on Dec. 7.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Dec. 7 said the cease-fire brokered between Israel and the Hamas terrorist group nearly two months ago will soon move to its next scheduled phase.
While speaking during a news conference with visiting German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Tel Aviv, Israel, Netanyahu said the cease-fire was “very shortly expected to move into [its] second phase,” which he said entails disarming Hamas and demilitarizing the Gaza Strip. That process, he said, may start at the end of December.
“We’re about to finish the first stage,” Netanyahu said. “But we have to make sure that we achieve the same results in the second stage, and that’s something I look forward to discussing with President Trump.”
U.S. President Donald Trump and Netanyahu are scheduled to have a meeting on the conflict and cease-fire next month, Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu on Dec. 7 stressed that the disarming of Hamas is important. It has been more than two years since the terrorist organization launched a series of attacks against Israel, killing more than 1,200 Israeli citizens and taking more than 250 hostages, including U.S. citizens.
Hamas must also comply with the “commitment which [it] undertook to disarm and have Gaza demilitarize,” Netanyahu said.
He said few people believed that the cease-fire’s first stage could be achieved, noting that the second phase will be just as challenging.
“As I mentioned to the chancellor, there’s a third phase, and that is to deradicalize Gaza, something that also people believed was impossible,“ he said. ”But it was done in Germany, it was done in Japan, it was done in the Gulf States. It can be done in Gaza, too, but of course Hamas has to be dismantled.”
In November, Trump urged Israeli President Isaac Herzog to pardon Netanyahu amid charges of fraud, bribery, and a breach of trust. Netanyahu has denied wrongdoing.
Trump said Netanyahu has operated as a “formidable and decisive War Time Prime Minister” who is “now leading Israel into a time of peace.” Those reasons are enough to pardon him, the U.S. president said.
