Hamas brushes off Trump’s threat and says it will only free hostages in return for a lasting truce

Hamas accuses Trump and Netanyahu of breaking ceasefire, demands release of hostages in exchange for peace.

The Hamas militant group on Thursday (March 6, 2025) brushed off President Donald Trump's latest threat and reiterated that it will only free the remaining Israeli hostages in exchange for a lasting ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

Hamas accused Mr. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to back out of the ceasefire agreement they reached in January. The agreement calls for negotiations over a second phase in which the hostages would be released in exchange for more Palestinian prisoners, a permanent ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

Hamas spokesman Abdel-Latif al-Qanoua said the “best path to free the remaining Israeli hostages” is through negotiations on that phase, which were supposed to begin in early February. Only limited preparatory talks have been held so far.

On Wednesday (March 5, 2025), Mr. Trump issued what he said was a “last warning” to Hamas after meeting with eight former hostages. The White House meanwhile confirmed it had held unprecedented direct talks with the militant group, which Israel and Western countries view as a terrorist organization.

“Release all of the Hostages now, not later, and immediately return all of the dead bodies of the people you murdered, or it is OVER for you,” Mr. Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Only sick and twisted people keep bodies, and you are sick and twisted!”

Both Israel and Hamas have a longstanding practice of holding onto the remains of their adversaries in order to trade them in hostage-prisoner deals.

Hamas is believed to still have 24 living hostages taken in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that triggered the war, including Israeli-American Edan Alexander. It is also holding the bodies of 34 others who were either killed in the initial attack or in captivity, as well as the remains of a soldier killed in the 2014 war.