NETANYAHU SENDS TRUMP'S 15-POINT PEACE PLAN BACK WITH TRACKED CHANGES
Israeli PM praises the effort, questions the sourcing, and adds 25 points nobody asked for.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday rejected President Trump's 15-point Gaza peace plan in the manner of a man returning a contractor's estimate with 'see attached' scrawled across the top, insisting no Israeli forces will withdraw until Hamas is disarmed so thoroughly that the group's remaining arsenal consists of strongly worded pamphlets. Netanyahu reportedly called the plan 'a solid rough draft' before circling six clauses and writing 'who approved this?' in the margins.
A spokesman for the Prime Minister's office attempted to clarify the position without technically contradicting the President who wrote it. 'Fifteen points is a very generous, very American number,' the spokesman said. 'We're really more of a 40-point program with footnotes, an appendix, and a binding arbitration clause. We appreciate the outline. We will be handling the actual plan.' Asked whether this constituted a rejection, he described it as 'aggressive collaborative editing.'
Hamas, for its part, issued a statement affirming it remains 'fully and enthusiastically committed' to a roadmap that neither combatant is currently walking, describing itself as 'still very much on board' the way a passenger is still very much on board a bus that left forty minutes ago without them. Diplomats close to the process say the plan now exists in three versions, none of which agree with each other, all of which are described internally as 'basically final.' Analysts note that both men consider themselves the foremost living expert on winning, which has made the negotiating table less a forum for peace than a very tense two-person book club where nobody finished the assigned reading.
