by Emmitt Barry, Worthy News Washington D.C. Bureau Chief
(Worthy News) – Senior Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal on Sunday reaffirmed the terrorist group’s refusal to disarm, rejecting demands from U.S. President Donald Trump and vowing to continue the fight against Israel.
Speaking at the 17th Al Jazeera Forum in Doha, Qatar, Mashaal said Hamas would not lay down its weapons during Phase 2 of Trump’s U.S.-backed peace plan, which calls for the group’s disarmament and the deployment of an international stabilization force in Gaza.
“As long as our people are under occupation, talk of disarmament is an attempt to make their elimination easier,” Mashaal said, adding that Hamas would not accept being held accountable for the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks it led against southern Israel. He described armed “resistance” as the right of what he called occupied peoples and again vowed to defeat Israel, calling the Jewish state an “existential threat.”
Mashaal praised the Oct. 7 massacre, which left about 1,200 people dead and 251 taken hostage, claiming it forced renewed international focus on the Palestinian issue. He also rejected the U.S.-supported National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, a proposed transitional body designed to exclude Hamas, denouncing what he termed “foreign rule” over the Strip.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry condemned the Al Jazeera Forum as a “gathering of jihadists and their support staff.” Trump has warned that Hamas would face swift destruction if it refuses to disarm, saying in January that the group had agreed in principle to give up its weapons under his plan—claims Hamas leaders, including Mashaal and senior figure Musa Abu Marzouk, have repeatedly denied.
Copyright 1999-2026 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
More Worthy News
Christians in Pakistan demand justice after police allegedly tortured and killed a Catholic father of four while elsewhere a 16-year-old Christian girl was abducted, “forcibly converted to Islam and possibly married to a Muslim prayer leader,” Christians said.
Americans lost more than $20 billion to cryptocurrency and other online scams in 2025, a 26% increase over the year before, according to the latest figures from the FBI.
U.S. President Donald J. Trump said Tuesday he had agreed on a two-week ceasefire with Iran that would include Israel, though the Jewish nation continued intercepting missiles fired by Iran-backed forces.
Iran has stepped up executions of people involved in protests against the country’s Islamic rulers, including a teenage musician who has become a symbol of human suffering in the Islamic Republic, as rights groups warn that thousands of detainees face the risk of death, injury, or execution.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance, on a visit to Hungary, condemned what he called “disgraceful” interference by the European Union in an election that could see Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán lose power for the first time in 16 years.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced Tuesday that it has completed deployment of ground troops along a strategic ridge in southern Lebanon — dubbed the “anti-tank line” — aimed at preventing Hezbollah from launching direct missile attacks on northern Israeli communities.
The Pentagon is preparing to request approximately $4.5 billion in fiscal year 2027 to replenish its stockpile of Tomahawk cruise missile, highlighting growing pressure on U.S. military resources after sustained global operations.