A senior Hamas official has called for an immediate end to Israel’s war against the group in the Gaza Strip and a plan to achieve a Palestinian state. Newsweek in the wake of former President Donald Trump’s election victory.

“The election of Trump as the 47th US president is a private matter for Americans,” said Basem Naim, Hamas Political Bureau member and spokesman. Newsweek“But the Palestinians look forward to an immediate cessation of aggression against our people, especially in Gaza, and seek assistance in realizing their legitimate rights to freedom, independence and the establishment of their independent, self-sovereign state with Jerusalem as its capital .” .”

“The blind support for the Zionist entity ‘Israel’ and its fascist government, at the expense of the future of our people and the security and stability of the region, must stop immediately,” he added.

While Trump was previously in power, he built a close relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who today is engaged in a multi-front war against the Iran-aligned Axis of Resistance, which began with a massive Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023. However, Trump has also criticized Netanyahu’s wartime leadership and called for a timely end to the conflict.

Reached for comment, an Israeli official said Newsweek that “maintaining and expanding the special relationship between the United States and Israel has been a bipartisan feature of American politics since the founding of the Jewish state.”

“We have no doubt that this will continue,” the Israeli official said. “Going forward, we look forward to a strong working relationship with his government to create a more peaceful, secure and prosperous Middle East.”

With continued signs of discord between President Joe Biden and Netanyahu over the course of the war, despite significant US military aid, the Israeli prime minister was the first to congratulate Trump on what was described as “the greatest comeback in history.”

“Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a strong renewed commitment to the great alliance between Israel and America,” Netanyahu said in his statement on Wednesday.

Netanyahu later spoke with Trump. The conversation was described by the Israeli side as a “warm and cordial” exchange in which the two “agreed to work together for Israel’s security, and also discussed the Iranian threat.”

Newsweek has contacted Hezbollah and the Iranian Permanent Mission to the United Nations for comment.

The war between Israel and Hamas, which has since expanded to include an Israeli air and land offensive against the Hezbollah movement in Lebanon, attacks by other Axis of Resistance factions in Iraq, Syria and Yemen and even direct exchanges of attacks between Israel and Iran, has proved to be a polarizing foreign policy issue in the US

While Biden has both continued to provide military aid to Israel and called for greater safeguards to limit damage to the civilian population, he has been accused by Israeli supporters of not doing enough to help the US ally and by pro-Palestinian factions have failed to sufficiently rein in Netanyahu. .

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign largely reflected the Biden administration’s stance, calling for peace and expressing compassion for the plight of civilians caught up in the conflict, while simultaneously halting all calls to halt arms sales to Israel were rejected.

In a statement issued Wednesday, Hamas also called for an end to Israel’s campaign in Lebanon and called on the US to “stop providing military support and political cover to the Zionist entity, and to protect the legitimate rights of our people.” acknowledge.”

“The American President-elect must listen to the voices that have been coming from within American society itself for more than a year regarding Zionist aggression on the Gaza Strip,” the statement said, “rejecting the occupation and genocide and objecting to the support and bias towards the Zionist entity.”

President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian National Authority, who heads the West Bank government that competes with Gaza-based Hamas, also congratulated Trump on his election victory on Wednesday.

Abbas expressed “his ambition to work with President Trump for peace and security in the region” and emphasized “the commitment of our people to the pursuit of freedom, self-determination and statehood, in accordance with international law,” according to a statement published by the Palestine News and Information Bureau (WAFA).

“We will remain steadfast in our commitment to peace,” Abbas said, “and we are confident that under your leadership the United States will support the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people.”

Both Hamas and Abbas had repeatedly condemned Trump’s actions in the Middle East during his time in office, including his 2018 decision to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the disputed city of Jerusalem and his 2020 plan to end to the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The proposal, widely labeled the “deal of the century,” would have given Israel control of internationally unrecognized Jewish settlements in the West Bank and occupied areas along the Jordanian border. Hamas and other Palestinian factions would be disarmed, the Palestinians would recognize Israel as a Jewish state, refrain from participating in international organizations without Israeli consent, and be given a swath of desert land along the Israel-Egypt border, as well as access to international investments.

In one of its most ambitious steps, the proposal also outlined the construction of a tunnel connecting the West Bank to Gaza.

Although the plan failed to gain momentum in the Arab world, later that year Trump successfully oversaw the Abraham Accords that led to the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco establishing diplomatic ties with Israel.

Trump also oversaw a sharp rise in tensions between Washington and Tehran, particularly over the US withdrawal from a multilateral nuclear deal in 2018 and the US killing of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force chief Major General Qassem Soleimani in Iraq in 2020.

The Republican leader has since accused Biden and Harris of being too soft on Iran and has repeatedly claimed that the war in Hamas would not have happened under his presidency. At the same time, Trump has accused his Democratic rivals of wanting to spark a bigger war in the Middle East, something he has vowed to avoid.

“We want a strong and powerful military and ideally we don’t have to use it,” Trump said during his victory speech on election night. “You know, we haven’t had any wars for four years. We haven’t had any wars. Besides defeating ISIS, we defeated ISIS in record time.”

“They said, ‘He will start a war.’ I’m not going to start a war,” Trump said early on Wednesday. “I’m going to stop wars.”