By Jacob Burg
Contributing Writer
President Donald Trump said on Thursday that if the Hamas terrorist group doesn’t stop killing people in the Gaza Strip, then the United States would have no other choice but to “go in and kill them.”
The remark comes nearly one week after a cease-fire was implemented between Israel and Hamas, and just two days after Trump had assured reporters during his meeting with Argentinian President Javier Milei that Hamas would lay down its arms. At the time, Trump warned that if Hamas didn’t, the United States would disarm the terrorist group directly.
“We will disarm them,” Trump said on Tuesday when asked by a reporter how he would guarantee that Hamas would disarm. “They know I’m not playing games.”
On Thursday, six days into the cease-fire, and as Israel and the United States are working on recovering all hostages’ bodies from the war-torn enclave, Trump stepped up his warning to Hamas amid reports of violence and shootings in the Gaza Strip.
“If Hamas continues to kill people in Gaza, which was not the deal, we will have no choice but to go in and kill them,” the president wrote on social media.
It’s not clear whether Trump was referring to direct U.S. military involvement in the Gaza Strip or coordination with the Israeli military.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.
On Wednesday, U.S. Central Command — the U.S. military’s Middle East command — urged Hamas to cease violence against civilians in Gaza and disarm “without delay.”
“We strongly urge Hamas to immediately suspend violence and shooting at innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza,” Cmdr. Brad Cooper, head of CENTCOM, said in a statement. “We have conveyed our concerns to the mediators who agreed to work with us to enforce the peace and protect innocent Gaza civilians.”
When asked about that statement hours later during a press conference with FBI Director Kash Patel, Trump suggested Hamas could be disarmed without direct U.S. military intervention.
“We won’t need the U.S. military. We won’t need it because we’re very much involved in it. If we weren’t involved, there wouldn’t be peace,” the president said.
Trump reiterated that he saw no reason for getting the U.S. military involved in the Gaza Strip.
“I don’t see that. No, I think we’re going to handle it very well. We’ll be helping Israel,” he said.
“Hamas has no support. See, Hamas had the support of Iran. And now Iran says, ‘Don’t get us involved.’ The last time they got them involved didn’t work out too well. So they used to have the support of Iran. Today, Iran is — they’re trying to survive.”
By Wednesday, Hamas had released the remaining 20 living hostages it took on Oct. 7, 2023. Israel and the United States are currently working on recovering the remains of the hostages who died in captivity.
Israel said it had received six bodies from Hamas, but that one did not match any of the hostages.
Three who were identified on Wednesday were those of Staff Sgt. Tamir Nimrodi, Uriel Baruch, and Eitan Levy, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office.
Nimrodi was kidnapped alive and killed while in captivity at age 18, while Baruch and Levy were killed during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack, and their bodies were taken to the Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces said.
Savannah Hulsey Pointer, T.J. Muscaro, Evgenia Filimianova, and Reuters contributed to this report.
