No State, No Surrender: Hamas rejected Witkoff’s statement about disarmament

Shafaq News – Gaza

Hamas declared on Saturday that it will not surrender its weapons unless an independent and fully sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital is established.

“The resistance and its weapons are a national and legal entitlement as long as the occupation continues, as recognized by international conventions and norms. They cannot be relinquished except through the full restoration of our national rights," Hamas stated.

The group also dismissed US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff’s recent comments suggesting Hamas was open to disarmament, calling them “false and misleading.”

Hamas’s declaration came in direct response to the “New York Declaration,” issued days earlier at a United Nations conference and backed by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, France, and the Arab League. The declaration called on Hamas to hand its weapons to the Palestinian Authority as part of a regional framework for a ceasefire and eventual Palestinian statehood.

Hamas rejected the demand outright, arguing that surrendering its weapons would strip Palestinians of their only means of resisting Israeli occupation.

The group also launched a fierce attack on the United States and its envoy, describing Witkoff’s recent visit to a Gaza aid distribution center as “a pre-planned theatrical stunt aimed at misleading public opinion and whitewashing the occupation.”

It accused the Trump administration of complicity in what it called “the crime of starvation and genocide,” and denounced the Israeli-administered Gaza Humanitarian Foundation as “an inhumane project created to complete the cycle of killing and annihilation.”