Vice President JD Vance is balancing hope with concern as he tours across Israel seeking to maintain the U.S.-led peace agreement that promises to establish a lasting peace in the Gaza Strip.
The vice president, visiting the region after an Israeli strike threatened to shatter the nonaggression sustained since the ceasefire, conveyed a sense of optimism but warned true peace will “take a very, very long time.”
“We are one week into President [Donald] Trump’s historic peace plan in the Middle East and things are going, frankly, better than I expected,” Vance said at a press conference in Kiryat Gat, Israel, on Tuesday.
Of particular concern to the White House is intelligence indicating that Hamas has failed to disarm and is using the truce as a window for extra-judicial killings of rival gang members.
Vance reaffirmed Trump’s warning that if the terrorist organization does not lay down its weapons, the United States will force it to do so “perhaps violently.”
“The terms of the 20-point plan that the president put out there is very clear,” Vance said. “It’s supported not just by Israel, but by all of our Gulf Arab friends. It’s that Hamas has to disarm. It’s that Hamas has to actually behave itself and that Hamas, while all the fighters can be given some sort of clemency, they’re not going to be able to kill each other, and they’re not going to be able to kill their fellow Palestinians.”
He continued: “Right now, where I stand, I feel confident that we’re going to be in a place where this peace lasts, where it’s durable, and if Hamas doesn’t cooperate, then, as the United States has said, Hamas is going to be obliterated.”
The vice president held his conference at the newly established Civilian-Military Cooperation Center, which is expected to play a significant role in implementing the 20-point peace plan.
Vance was joined by key architects of the Gaza peace deal — U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.
Second lady Usha Vance has accompanied him throughout his trip to the region. They are expected to spend three days in the Middle East before returning to Washington, D.C.
Trump alluded to the continued violence being perpetuated by Hamas on fellow Gazans in a Truth Social post just hours before Vance’s press conference.
The president claimed that Middle East allies of the U.S. have offered to send in their own militaries to establish law and order in the Gaza Strip if Hamas does not disarm.
“Numerous of our NOW GREAT ALLIES in the Middle East, and areas surrounding the Middle East, have explicitly and strongly, with great enthusiasm, informed me that they would welcome the opportunity, at my request, to go into GAZA with a heavy force and ‘straighten our Hamas’ if Hamas continues to act badly, in violation of their agreement with us,” Trump asserted.
He thanked the unnamed countries for the offer but said it was not yet necessary.
“There is still hope that Hamas will do what is right,” he continued. “If they do not, an end to Hamas will be FAST, FURIOUS, & BRUTAL!”
The Israel Defense Forces initiated a strike against Hamas on Sunday after two soldiers were allegedly killed by terrorist militants in Rafah. Observers worried that the back-and-forth would collapse the delicate peace established earlier this month, but the IDF said it has “renewed enforcement of the ceasefire” following the operation.
Vance reiterated on Tuesday that U.S. troops will not be deployed to the region under any circumstances. Instead, the White House sees itself as a purely logistical and diplomatic leader coordinating disparate powers that are all interested in taking a more proactive role.
“There are not going to be American boots on the ground in Gaza. The president of the United States has made that very clear, all of our military leadership has made that very clear. What we can do is provide some useful coordination,” the vice president said.
GAZA CEASEFIRE ‘RENEWED’ AFTER STRIKES ON HAMAS, IDF SAYS
He continued, “How do you take the Gulf Arab States, plus Israel, plus the Turks, plus the Indonesians — how do you actually get those folks to work together in a way that actually produces long-term peace? The only real mediators are the United States of America.”
Vance will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog on Wednesday.
