America's Talking - Trump gives Hamas a Sunday deadline to agree to peace deal, or else

Episode Date: October 3, 2025

(The Center Square) – A hard deadline has been set for Hamas to agree to a peace deal proposed by President Donald Trump and accepted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, warning this is their “last chance.” Trump told Hamas leaders that they have until 6 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 5, Washington, D.C. time, warning this is their last chance or “all HELL” will break loose. In a Friday Truth Social post, the president described the terror group as a “ruthless and violent threat” in the Middle East.Support this podcast: https://secure.anedot.com/franklin-news-foundation/ce052532-b1e4-41c4-945c-d7ce2f52c38a?source_code=xxxxxxRead more: https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/article_48b0ac68-4115-4480-b9e5-24d7e7ff6464.html Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to America's Talking, powered by the Center Square. I'm Dan McAelib, executive editor of the Center Square Newswire Service. Time is running out for the terrorist organization Hamas to agree to terms of a peace deal with Israel. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Nutt & Yahoo agreed to a 20-point plan to end Israel's assault on Hamas in Gaza. Many other Arab and Muslim nations also agreed to the terms, but Hamas has yet to do so. Joining me to discuss this is the Center Square's White House Bureau, Chief Sarah Roderick Fitch. Sarah, when is the deadline and what happens if Hamas does not agree to terms by then? The deadline has sort of been a little bit fluid. Earlier this week, the president indicated he was giving Hamas three to four days. And so that time has pretty much come and past. So not exactly sure where things stand. However, there are different reports saying that Hamas is likely going to reject the peace proposal. If that's the case, case, it doesn't look very good for Hamas. On Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated that they were basically going to be finishing. Israel would finish the job. He said they would finish

the job. They would go on their own. He didn't ask for any sort of military support or anything like that, but he said they'd finish the job, essentially taking out Hamas. And last week, they had put out some leaflets telling Ghazans to move to the south. is sort of an indication that they were going to try to, you know, maybe there was going to be some sort of assault. There's really not much that's happened since then, simply because this peace deal has been sort of in limbo currently. But behind the scenes, a country like Qatar has been very instrumental in Egypt as well and trying to push this deal with Hamas. And it's very important that all these countries came on board and agreed, to this 20 point, this 20 point deal, because that sort of, it would, if Hamas rejects it,

it's very possible they're going to, they're going to lose a lot of their support, any sort of support there in the Middle East, and not just the Middle East, but also Europe, because there was a lot of European leaders who pushed for a state, you know, a Palestinian state, statehood. And so it could really, you know, damage them kind of their case, on the world stage, but also it's putting them in a position where Israel could definitely go in and basically try to to eliminate them. As we said, Trump and Netanyahu agreed to this 20-point plan. Give us some of the nuts and bolter, the major themes of what those 20 points are.

Hamas cannot continue to lead Gaza, is my understanding. Yes, yes. They have to completely disarm. they would have absolutely no power. They would be given in sort of Gaza. Part of it was the Israelis would sort of pull back. There would be a line as far as they pulled back. There would be an international,

which were actually kind of overseen by the president, but also former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, would be helping with that, sort of the neutral parties to oversee the management of it and how things go. So that was, yes, that was a big thing, was they would have to disarm. Also a big thing, especially for Israel, is not just disarming, but within 72 hours of Israel, because it would be the Hamas with Sina and then Israel would go ahead and sign it and, you know, and so forth.

Israel would then say, okay, you need to release all the hostages and the deceased need to be returned to Israel within 72 hours. That is also a big part of the deal, which has been a major issue for Israel. I mean, they've been saying, hey, we want these, we want these hostages back. I believe they're 48. I think they're 48th they believe are still alive. They're being held captive. Those are sort of the big points. And also, Israel, as far as Israel goes, Israel couldn't annex, you know, Gaza or the West Bank.

So there's definitely give and take on both sides. But Hamas would essentially lose its any sort of authority, any governing power, anything like that. And that obviously would be a huge issue to an issue. with them and complete disarmament as well. We're approaching the two-year anniversary of the October 7th, 2023 anniversary of the attacks where Hamas snuck attack into Israel, and that's what started the war. The sneak attack by Hamas into Israel left 1,200 people dead, most of them as civilians, and Hamas took about 200 hostages, some of which they've released, some of which are believed to be deceased, and that includes Americans.

Sarah, you referenced heading into that two-year anniversary that if Hamas does not agree to this deal, that Israel will finish the job. What does that look like? Is that like an all-out ground assault into Gaza, or what is that? It's very possible. I think that would be kind of, that's not ideal situation. It's never an ideal situation to go in because Hamas, there's civilians, there's people who, you know, would probably fight for them.

It would be very dicey. It would probably be a ballet battle. But Israel is willing to do it. They have shown their power, their strength, their intelligence, everything like that. What they can do as an example, I think, Hezbollah and how they dismantled, really, the Hezbollah leadership. And that was in Lebanon. That was a completely another country. They have a little bit more leverage there in Gaza.

and what they did to what they did to Hezbollah, their leadership, and they continue to just take them out. And they've been doing that with Hamas too. And it's one of those things where these people keep coming up. But they absolutely, they've shown what they can do. And for instance, Hezbollah's case, they were there in Beirut. And it may not necessarily need ground action because with Hezbollah, they did the pager the coordinated pager attack, where they went off and they killed and named tons of Hezbollah members,

and then also went after the leadership and they targeted them. They knew exactly where the buildings were, basically kind of used bunker buster bombs. I mean, they went down. And that was their in Beirut. So their intelligence is pretty good. So it may not require that, but it will certainly be challenging because, there's quite a bit of resistance there in Gaza. And also one of the things is that Prime Minister Netanyahu mentioned this and one of the other issues that has been ongoing is it's one of the things that it wasn't part of the 20-point deal, but something that they want stopped and eliminated is sort of this propaganda and doing this with children too, is sort of fueling children and pushing this on children to be militant and everything like that, that's been ongoing.

And he mentioned that in his speech on Monday. And that's a concern. So when you have this, it's not just Hamas leaders, but there's really, there's been a huge propaganda push there within Gaza. And so it could be, it could be very bloody, it could be challenging. No doubt that they could do it. But just looking at what they were able to accomplish with Hezbollah, it may not be necessary. One final question, Sarah. President Trump has touted the fact that he's been able to negotiate peace in several other ongoing wars in his second term. If he were to pull this off, if Hamas were to agree to this and there is peace in Israel and Gaza, that would be quite remarkable. It would. And that's what he's pushing for. It would be, and especially to not only that, but, Hamas is not a country. So he's been dealing with, you know, other countries. This is a terror organization. And so to be able to do that and to be able to build this coalition of other Arab nations, really that's the important thing is, is to have those countries,

it's sort of the Abraham Accords and to be able to do that, is to bring them to not just to take out the Hamas, you know, take out Hamas from the situation, but Israel and these other Arab nations, Muslim nations, Egypt, like I said, is one of them. Jordan and Israel have always sort of had an amicable relationship, but we're talking, you know, but I think like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, there are always been sort of at odds. But that they can come together on this, I think that for the president himself, that alone

is a huge achievement to sort of come to a peace agreement. And I think he sort of sees that as a window of opportunity there. And so for him, that itself is a huge victory. Sarah, thank you for joining us today. Listeners can keep up with this story and more at thecentersquare.com.