Announcement comes after UK, France, and Canada said they plan to recognise Palestine in September
Hamas has said it will not disarm until an independent Palestinian state is established with Jerusalem as its capital.
The announcement comes after the UK, France, and Canada all set out plans to recognise Palestine at the United Nations General Assembly in September.
The Palestinian militant group issued a statement on Saturday “in response to media reports quoting US envoy Steve Witkoff, claiming [Hamas] has shown willingness to disarm”.
The statement said: “We reaffirm that resistance and its arms are a legitimate national and legal right as long as the occupation continues.
“This right is recognised by international laws and norms, and it cannot be relinquished except through the full restoration of our national rights – first and foremost, the establishment of an independent, fully sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.”
Sir Keir Starmer laid out plans on Tuesday to recognise a Palestinian state in September unless Israel takes “substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza, agree to a ceasefire, and commits to a long-term sustainable peace”.
Donald Trump said he had not discussed the move with Starmer, claiming that recognising a Palestinian state would “reward Hamas”.
“You’re rewarding Hamas if you do that. I don’t think they should be rewarded,” he said on Tuesday evening.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch also condemned the announcement on Saturday, saying it “rewards terrorism”.
She accused Starmer of making the decision to “solve a problem on his own backbenches” rather than to help the people of Gaza.
Badenoch said: “It doesn’t help end the war. It doesn’t bring back hostages. It’s the wrong thing to do at the wrong time. It rewards terrorism.”
Hamas releases video of emaciated hostage
The family of 24-year-old Israeli hostage Evyatar David has released a video taken by Hamas showing him in visibly dire physical condition.
This comes after Hamas released footage on Friday showing David in what appears to be a tunnel, documenting his daily food intake in a handwritten chart.
On Saturday, the family cleared for publication a second video dated 27 July, in which David says he has been without proper food or water for an extended period and claims he was forced by his captors to dig his own grave.
“I don’t know what I’m going to eat. I haven’t eaten in days,” he said in the video. “I’ve been living in a really difficult situation and have been for many months.”
Video footage of Evyatar David, posted on Friday and released with the family’s consent
The David family said in a statement: “We are forced to witness our beloved son and brother, Evyatar David, deliberately and cynically starved in Hamas’s tunnels in Gaza.
David was taken hostage during the militant group’s cross-border attack on Israel on 7 October, 2023.
He is among some 50 hostages that remain in Gaza, at least 20 of whom are believed to be alive.
Hamas released the videos after the US and Israel withdrew from ceasefire talks last week.
On Thursday, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad published a separate video of hostage Rom Braslavski.
The 21-year-old’s family said he appears “thin, limp, and crying” in the video, which has not been made public.
After the videos were released, thousands of protesters took to the streets of Tel Aviv on Saturday to urge the Israeli government to take bolder steps toward the release of the hostages.
She added: “We believe in a two-state solution, but you have to do that after a peace settlement, when you know what the borders are going to be, when you know who is going to be running one of those states, not just giving a blanket free pass to Hamas, a terrorist organisation.”
Badenoch also pointed to warnings from an influential group of peers that Starmer’s pledge could breach international law as the territory may not meet the criteria for statehood under the Montevideo Convention, a treaty signed in 1933.
A letter signed by 40 members of the House of Lords and sent to Attorney General Lord Hermer raised concerns over the legality of the Prime Minister’s policy.
The Montevideo Convention says a state must possess a permanent population, a defined territory, a government and the capacity to enter into relations with other states.
However, the letter argued there is no functioning single government and diplomatic relations cannot be established with Hamas, which is a proscribed terror group in the UK.
In its statement on Saturday, Hamas also hit back at Witkoff’s visit to an aid distribution site in central Gaza on Friday, saying it was “nothing more than a premeditated staged show”.
Witkoff and Mike Huckabee, the US ambassador to Israel, visited a centre run by the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) on Friday.
Hamas said the trip was “designed to mislead public opinion, polish the image of the occupation, and provide it with political cover for its starvation campaign and continued systematic killing of defenceless children and civilians in the Gaza Strip”.
White House special envoy Steve Witkoff, center, visits a food distribution site in Gaza City (Photo: David Azaguri/US Embassy Jerusalem via AP)
Witkoff said he spent “over five hours in Gaza”.
Posting on X, he added: “The purpose of the visit was to give [Trump] a clear understanding of the humanitarian situation and help craft a plan to deliver food and medical aid to the people of Gaza.”
Earlier on Saturday, Witkoff met in Tel Aviv with families of Israeli hostages who are still in Gaza.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum cited Witkoff as saying that ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas should be “all or nothing”, with all 50 hostages returned in one go.
“The plan is not to expand the war, but to end it. We think the negotiations should be changed to all or nothing. End the war and bring all 50 hostages home at the same time – that’s the only way,” Witkoff reportedly said.
