What exactly did Netanyahu reject: Trump’s plan — or the mechanism that was supposed to make Israel and Hamas implement it step by step?

Israel has not officially accepted the new 15-point roadmap for Gaza, but negotiations with the US continue. The main contradiction was not hidden in the word ‘peace’, but in the sequence of two actions: first the disarmament of Hamas or first the phased withdrawal of the IDF.

Author: Elena Gunko

Elena Gunko is a NANews author working on topics related to Israel, Ukraine, and international affairs. In this material, the author compares the official position of the Israeli government with previous stages of the American plan and separates confirmed decisions from their political interpretations.

On August 9, 2026, Benjamin Netanyahu made a statement that the world media quickly described as Israel’s rejection of Donald Trump’s new plan for Gaza. But the official text from the Prime Minister’s Office allows for a more precise question.

Netanyahu said that Israel does not accept the 15-point document. At the same time, he formulated a condition he considers fundamental: the IDF should not carry out further withdrawal until the real disarmament of Hamas — including heavy and light weapons.

NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency primarily relies on the official statement from the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office dated August 9, 2026, while reports from world media are used to understand international reactions and additional details.

At the same time, Netanyahu did not announce the cessation of negotiations with Washington. On the contrary, he stated that discussions with the American side continue: among the ideas proposed by the US, there are those acceptable to Israel and those that are not.

And here lies the main difference, without which the loud headline ‘Israel rejected Trump’s plan’ explains only half of what is happening.

20 points and 15 points: what exactly changed

Donald Trump’s original plan for Gaza consisted of 20 points. Israel agreed to this structure in 2025.

NANews then separately analyzed the 20-point plan itself and the question of whether it could ensure sustainable stabilization. The document already included two things that are now at the center of the dispute: the demilitarization of Gaza and the gradual withdrawal of Israeli troops.

In other words, the idea of the future withdrawal of the IDF did not appear in August 2026. Nor is the demand to deprive Hamas of military potential new.

The new problem is the sequence of actions and the method of verifying the fulfillment of obligations.

The 15-point roadmap is supposed to translate the general provisions of the previous plan into a practical process. The transition to the next stage is linked to the verified fulfillment of previous obligations, and the disarmament of armed groups is linked to the gradual Israeli withdrawal.

This is already a completely different level of obligations.

A political document can define the end point: Hamas without weapons, a new governance system for Gaza, international forces, and the gradual departure of the IDF.

The roadmap must answer a more dangerous question: who exactly makes the first irreversible step?

1. For Israel, such a step is the withdrawal of the army from another territory.
2. For Hamas, it is the transfer of weapons and the loss of military infrastructure.

This knot existed back in the fall of 2025. Before the start of negotiations on October 6, NANews wrote about the dispute over the implementation of Trump’s plan: formal agreement with the general scheme did not yet mean agreement with the sequence of its implementation.

Now this dispute has come out of the negotiation rooms.

Israel demands not promises to disarm, but results

Netanyahu’s official position on August 9, 2026, is extremely specific: there will be no further withdrawal of the IDF until the disarmament of Hamas.

Moreover, the Prime Minister specifically contrasted real disarmament with what he called fictitious. According to him, it should concern all weapons.

Reuters describes practically the same knot from two sides: Israel demands that disarmament occur before the movement of Israeli troops, while Hamas insists on Israel fulfilling its obligations and ceasing military actions before implementing the part of the agreements concerning weapons.

It is important to separate this from political statements.

Fact: Israel did not accept the current 15-point document.

Position of the Israeli government: the withdrawal of the IDF should not occur until the complete and verifiable disarmament of Hamas.

Position of Hamas, conveyed by international media: the group declares its commitment to the roadmap agreed with mediators but links its actions to Israel fulfilling its obligations.

What has not yet been established: what changed order of actions the US is ready to offer Israel and what exactly from the American proposals Netanyahu considers acceptable. The Prime Minister has not publicly disclosed this.

This is the boundary of what is proven as of the evening of August 9. Everything else is still political forecasts.

But the dispute is broader than one withdrawal calendar.

The new roadmap involves the transfer of civil and security governance to a new Palestinian structure, international control over the implementation of agreements, and gradual movement towards a different model of governance for Gaza. The document also retains the prospect of a political path to Palestinian self-determination and statehood.

On August 9, Netanyahu simultaneously reiterated the opposite political position: under him, there will be no Palestinian state either in Gaza or in Judea and Samaria.

Therefore, the confrontation is happening on two levels at once.

The first is military-technical: when to withdraw the IDF relative to the disarmament of Hamas.

The second is political: what should appear in Gaza after the transitional period and where the American process should ultimately lead.

Rejection of the plan or rejection of the mechanism?

World media have every reason for strong headlines.

Reuters writes about Netanyahu’s rejection of the new plan. The New York Times, BBC, and CNN also view the events through Netanyahu’s relations with Trump and internal Israeli politics ahead of the elections.

Elections to the Knesset are scheduled for October 27, 2026. Netanyahu is indeed caught between two sources of pressure: the Trump administration, which is trying to advance the next stage of the process, and the right-wing part of his political base, for which further withdrawal of the IDF without the prior dismantling of Hamas’s military capabilities is unacceptable.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich supported the hard line after the Prime Minister’s statement: according to his position, the IDF should not withdraw, and the reconstruction of Gaza cannot begin until the military potential of Hamas is dismantled.

But explaining what is happening only by elections means losing the very subject of the dispute.

NANews compared three points of the process.

In the 20-point plan, Israel already agreed to the principle of gradual troop withdrawal with the creation of a new security system.

In the 15-point roadmap, this principle turns into a linked and verifiable process, where the actions of one side should open the next stage for the other.

On August 9, Netanyahu says: for Israel, such a mutual mechanism is insufficient — real disarmament of Hamas must occur first.

Hence the answer to the main question.

As of August 9, Israel’s rejection of the current 15-point roadmap is confirmed. But Netanyahu’s official statement does not imply that Israel has rejected the entire original 20-point structure of Trump’s plan. Moreover, negotiations with the US continue.

This distinction cannot be considered semantic.

If the Americans change the mechanism so that complete disarmament precedes further withdrawal of the IDF, the current crisis may remain a dispute about the implementation of the previous plan.

If Washington considers mutual phasing mandatory and Israel continues to reject it, the divergence will become a dispute about the very architecture of the agreement.

There is also a third limit: Palestinian statehood. Even if the parties agree on the order of disarmament and troop withdrawal, the political endpoint of the American scheme remains in contradiction with Netanyahu’s public position.

Therefore, the phrase ‘Israel rejected Trump’s plan’ is too short for what happened on August 9.

It would be more accurate to say: Israel rejected the proposed mechanism for transitioning to the next stage of Trump’s plan and demanded a change in the main rule of sequence — Hamas must first truly disarm, and only then can the IDF move further.

These disagreements are officially confirmed so far. Whether the 15-point document itself will be changed and which American proposals Israel is ready to accept have not been publicly reported.

Main primary source: official statement from the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office dated August 9, 2026.

Additional verification of international reaction and sequence of events: Reuters; reports from BBC, CNN, and The New York Times.