Washington DC – US President Donald Trump’s envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, announced that he will visit Gaza in the coming days as part of what he called an “inspection team” to monitor the ceasefire agreement reached between Israel and Hamas last week.

During an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, Witkoff said he would tour two Israeli-controlled areas in Gaza, as part of an upcoming trip to Israel.

“I will be part of the inspection team in the Netzarim Corridor and also in the Philadelphia Corridor,” Witkopf said. “This is where there are outside supervisors, making sure that people are safe and that people coming in are not armed, and no one has bad motives.”

The Netzarim Corridor separates northern and southern Gaza, and has been occupied by Israeli forces since its invasion of the Palestinian Strip in late October 2023. The Philadelphia Corridor runs between southern Gaza and Egypt. The Israeli army took “operational control” of the area in May of last year.

This will be the envoy’s first visit to the Middle East since Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire agreement on January 15. Lack of previous diplomatic experienceHe had previously joined the talks in Qatar that led to the deal.

This will also be Witkopf’s first trip since Trump took office on Monday. Since his inauguration, Trump has said he has little confidence that the agreement will hold. The deal went into effect on Sunday, and a day later, an Israeli sniper entered He killed a child In Rafah, in an incident documented on video.

“We have to make sure that the implementation goes well, because if it goes well, we will enter the second phase, and we will remove a lot of live bodies,” Witkopf said, referring to Israeli prisoners being held in prisons. Gaza.

“And I think that’s the president’s directive to me and everyone else who works in the American government on this matter.”

Three-stage deal

A ceasefire agreement has been reached Three stages. Implementation of the first phase has only begun.

Over the next six weeks, this phase is supposed to witness a pause in the fighting. Partial withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, including from the Netzarim Corridor; And increase pocket aid.

Fifteen months of war in Gaza have flattened the Strip and displaced the vast majority of its population. The United Nations has repeatedly warned of an impending famine in northern Gaza, and its experts have done so Comparison of Israeli war tactics To genocide.

In all, there were at least 47,107 Palestinians He was killed in Gaza Since October 7, 2023. Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel have killed 1,139 people and captured more than 200 others.

The first phase of the ceasefire also aims to release 33 Israeli prisoners from Gaza and about 1,000 Palestinians from Israeli prisons. So far, three Israeli prisoners and 90 Palestinian prisoners have been released.

The second and third phases were agreed upon in principle, but negotiations on the details are still ongoing. The second phase is expected to witness the release of the remaining Israeli prisoners in exchange for the “complete withdrawal” of Israeli forces from Gaza.

This goal contradicts Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s previous pledges to maintain control over Gaza’s security indefinitely after the war. He also called on the far-right members of Netanyahu’s government to return to fighting after the end of the first phase.

The details of the third phase are less clear, but it is said to include plans to reconstruct Gaza for several years and return the bodies of prisoners.

The current agreement does not include any agreements on who will rule Gaza after the war.

“Not sure”

Witkoff spoke to Fox News a day after Trump told reporters that he was “not confident” that the ceasefire agreement would hold.

“This is not our war. This is their war. But I’m not sure,” Trump told a reporter during a photo op at the White House. “I looked at the picture of Gaza. “Gaza is like a huge demolition site.”

The US President, whose first term extended from 2017 to 2021, had called for a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel before his inauguration day. Promising “Hell to pay” if one is not reached.

It was not immediately clear how Trump would respond if Israel withdrew from the agreement.

Trump has generally been more amenable to Israeli interests than his predecessor, former President Joe Biden.

However, the Biden administration has pledged “unwavering” support for Israel and has refused to benefit from billions of dollars in military support that the United States is providing to Israel in exchange for a ceasefire.

Both Trump and Biden have claimed credit for reaching the ceasefire agreement this month.

As he begins his second term, Trump is expected to expand US support for Israel. for him administrationFor example, it is full of pro-Israel hawks, including supporters of illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.

Indeed, he has Peeled again Biden-era sanctions on Israeli settler groups accused of committing violence against Palestinians.

However, Trump has pledged to be a global peacemaker and end conflicts abroad as part of his “America First” agenda.

Speaking on Wednesday, Witkoff praised Trump’s “peace through strength” approach as the driving force behind the ceasefire, while acknowledging that the incoming administration had not engaged in the “mathematics” shaping the terms of the deal.

Renewed push for normalization

Witkoff also said he hopes to revive the Israeli-Arab normalization efforts that Trump led during his first term, in order to make Israel less diplomatically isolated.

The so-called Abraham Accords saw Israel establishing diplomatic relations with Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Sudan, but the negotiations were widely criticized for marginalizing Palestinian interests.

Experts also said so was the future of the Abraham Accords I was thrown into doubt Amid regional anger over the war in Gaza.

However, Witkoff said he believes an elusive normalization deal with Saudi Arabia is still possible. He went further, saying he believed every country in the region could “join” such a deal.

Witkopf said: “My personal opinion is that the conditional precedent for normalization was a ceasefire.” “We needed to convince people again.”

When asked to identify other countries he believed would be open to reaching an agreement, Witkoff pointed to Qatar, praising its role as a mediator in the Gaza negotiations.

Qatar has repeatedly rejected the possibility of normalizing relations with Israel.