From the Liveblog of
Monday, February 16, 2026
Top Netanyahu aide: Hamas will have 60 days to disarm or IDF will complete the mission
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleLazar Berman is The Times of Israel's diplomatic reporter
Hamas will have a 60-day period to disarm, or else Israel will go back to war in Gaza, says Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs.
Speaking in Jerusalem to the Besheva Group conference, Fuchs says that the Trump Administration asked for the 60-day period, and “we are respecting that.”
During that time, says the senior adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Hamas “will have to give up all of its weapons,” including rifles.
The terror group’s AK-47s “will be taken from them entirely,” he says, adding that he is not sure when the period starts, but it might begin with Thursday’s Board of Peace conference.
“We will evaluate it,” he says. “If it works, great. If not, then the IDF will have to complete the mission.”
He says it is a “reasonable estimate” that before Israeli elections that could potentially be held in June, Hamas will have either given up its weapons or the IDF will be in the middle of an intensive military campaign in Gaza.
Fuchs says that there are many tunnels that also need to be destroyed as part of the process, “on our side as well.”
“Today, whoever plows the fields in Be’eri sees the sea,” he says of the Gaza border kibbutz invaded by Hamas on October 7, 2023. “There is barely a building left standing in the Gaza Strip, but the work is not yet completed.”
The Times of Israel Community.