Trump plan Hamas to demand crucial changes before it says yes, sources say

Hamas will demand key revisions to Donald Trump's Gaza ceasefire proposal but is likely to accept the plan in the coming days as a basis for renewed negotiations, analysts and sources close to the group say.

- Jason Burke International security correspondent

Trump imposed a deadline of “three or four days” from Tuesday for Hamas to give its response to his 20-point plan, which aims to bring the two-year war in Gaza to a close, and allow an apparently indefinite international administration of the devastated territory or “pay in hell”.

Mkhaimar Abusada, a political scientist from Gaza based in Cairo, said Hamas now had to “choose between the bad and the worst”.

“If they say no, as Trump has made clear, that will not be good and will allow Israel to do whatever it takes to finish this. They will say: ‘Yes, but we need this and that,” Abusada said.

Hugh Lovatt, a senior fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said it would be very difficult for Hamas to accept the terms unconditionally. “That is understandable,” he said. “The text lacks details. But then anything other than total and final acceptance will be used against Hamas by Israel, the Trump administration and possibly the Europeans.”

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, has accepted the Trump plan, which has incorporated many of Israel's principal demands and was formulated without consulting Hamas. Netanyahu has said Israel would “finish the job” if Hamas rejected the proposal or slowed its implementation.