Trump says he will decide whether Marwan Barghouti should be freed and will visit Gaza soon

US President Donald Trump said he will decide whether to push Israel to free jailed Palestinian political leader Marwan Barghouti, and that he plans to visit the Gaza Strip soon.

These are just two nuggets of information that Trump shared in a wide-ranging interview with TIME Magazine published on Thursday, in which he discussed the ceasefire in Gaza and the administration’s next steps in the region.

The interview comes as Trump continues to take a victory lap for brokering a fragile ceasefire in Gaza. The agreement has been marred by violations, including Israel’s refusal to open the Rafah border crossing and Israeli air strikes on the enclave. 

Meanwhile, Hamas has not disarmed, and an international peacekeeping force of Arab and Muslim states has yet to deploy to the enclave, despite both of these items being listed in Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza.

Trump visited Israel and Egypt earlier this month to celebrate the ceasefire. In the Time interview, he continued to emphasise his role in sealing the deal.

The US president portrayed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the biggest obstacle to an agreement, and not Hamas.

“He (Netanyahu) would have just kept going,” Trump told TIME. “It could have gone on for years. It would have gone on for years. But I stopped him, and everybody came together when I stopped him.”

Trump also said that his decision to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities in June, joining Israel in its surprise attack on the Islamic Republic, catalysed his deal in Gaza.

“It would have been impossible to make a deal like this before,” Trump said. “No president was willing to do it, and I was willing to do it. And by doing it, we had a different Middle East.”

The ceasefire in Gaza is not even one month old, but Trump has had to dispatch a slew of aides and lieutenants to Israel to ensure its stability.

Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner travelled to Israel earlier this week. In a first for the administration, US Vice President JD Vance appears to be taking a more public role on the file, visiting Israel on Wednesday and Thursday.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio also arrived on Thursday. 

West Bank annexation

Vance, who is seen as one of the closest heirs to Trump’s so-called "America First" brand of foreign policy, lashed out at the Israeli Knesset on Thursday for voting to advance two bills that would annex the occupied West Bank.

“That was weird,” Vance said, “It was a very stupid political stunt, and I personally take some insult to it. The policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel.”

West Bank annexation 'won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries'

- US President Donald Trump

Vance’s comment comes after Trump repeatedly said he would prevent Israeli annexation. He made the first pledge before brokering a ceasefire in Gaza, and he repeated it in his interview with TIME.

“It won’t happen because I gave my word to the Arab countries,” he said. “Israel would lose all of its support from the United States if that happened.”

Many analysts and diplomats in the region have said the Gaza ceasefire risks imploding unless the Trump administration focuses on key details, such as governance.

Trump brokered the deal in part because he skipped over those gruelling details in negotiations, but on one key detail, post-war Gaza's leadership, he appeared to show some knowledge.

Barghouti's fate

Trump told TIME that he does not believe Mahmoud Abbas, the octogenarian president of the Palestinian Authority, can lead post-war Gaza.

Trump signalled for the first time that it may be difficult to find a Palestinian partner with whom his administration can work. “They don’t have a leader right now,” Trump said. “At least a visible leader. And they don’t really want to, because every one of those leaders has been shot. It’s not a hot job.”

It was not clear whether he was referring to the Palestinian Authority, Hamas or the Palestinian leadership in general. 

Who is Marwan Barghouti and why won't Israel release him?

Read More »

He said that he has been in recent discussions about freeing Barghouti from prison.

Barghouti is the most popular Palestinian politician, according to opinion polls. He was a member of the secular Palestinian party Fatah and a deputy to Yasser Arafat.

He is seen as an uncorrupt, non-partisan leader who could unite disparate Palestinian factions.

He has been imprisoned in Israel since 2002, serving five life sentences for his alleged role in murders during the Second Intifada. 

Middle East Eye reported that Arab mediators and Witkoff agreed on a prisoner list that would have freed Barghouti during the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire, but his name was unilaterally removed by the Israeli prime minister’s office at the last minute.

“I was literally being confronted with that question about 15 minutes before you called,” Trump replied when asked about whether he would press Israel to free Barghouti. “So I’ll be making a decision.”

Saudi Arabia 

Trump told TIME he intends to visit Gaza soon. That would make him the first US president in history to visit the enclave. But he was also clear that his main focus is beyond Gaza.

Trump considers the 2020 Abraham Accords, in which the UAE, Morocco and Bahrain established full diplomatic relations with Israel, a hallmark of his foreign policy. He has lobbied heavily for Saudi Arabia to join the accords, but Riyadh has resisted.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman publicly declared that Israel committed genocide in the Gaza Strip and refused to discuss normalisation while Israel’s onslaught was ongoing. Riyadh has also called for irrevocable steps towards a Palestinian state as a precondition to a deal.

Trump did not say he expects progress on a Palestinian state soon, but he told TIME that he believes Riyadh will join the agreements by the end of 2025.

“I think Saudi Arabia is going to lead the way,” he said.

“We don’t have the Iran threat anymore. We don’t have any threats anymore. We have peace in the Middle East.”