Israel Clashes With U.S. Over Turkey, Qatar Involvement in Gaza Oversight
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the White House efforts are ‘contrary to its policy,’ a rare public admonishment
Israel publicly opposes the inclusion of Turkey and Qatar in the U.S.-established Gaza Executive Board.
Prime Minister Netanyahu said the committee was “not coordinated with Israel and contrary to its policy,” reflecting deep distrust of Turkey and Qatar.
The Gaza Executive Board, part of President Trump’s peace plan, aims to oversee reconstruction and demilitarization, but Israel seeks changes to its composition.
TEL AVIV—Israel is publicly pushing back against the makeup of a U.S. committee created to oversee Gaza, which includes Israeli rivals like Turkey and Qatar.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that the committee established by the White House to help advance the next phases of the Gaza cease-fire was “not coordinated with Israel and contrary to its policy.”
The comments were a rare public admonishment of U.S. efforts to enact a 20-point peace plan spearheaded by President Trump. It reflects Israel’s deep distrust of both Turkey and Qatar, and their support for Hamas, a U.S. designated terrorist group. Both countries are home to Hamas senior political officials.
The U.S. administration didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Netanyahu’s statement.
The White House on Friday announced the establishment of the “Gaza Executive Board,” which will be involved in reconstruction and demilitarization of the Gaza Strip in line with Trump’s peace plan.
Among the members included on the board are Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and senior Qatari official Ali Thawadi. Other members include Egyptian and Emirati officials, former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and an Israeli-Cypriot businessman, but no Palestinians.
Israel made clear its opposition to the inclusion of Turkey and Qatar, said Miri Regev, a senior minister in Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party, in an interview Sunday with Army Radio. “We’ve said it clearly to Trump and those around him,” she said. Regev said Israel was working to change the makeup of the executive committee.
Israel and Turkey are former allies, but their relations have been souring for years and Israel’s war in Gaza has accelerated their rivalry. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has downgraded diplomatic relations with Israel and compared Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler. The two are also at odds over events in Syria. Israel is distrustful of the new president, Ahmad al-Sharaa, a former al Qaeda militant. Turkey has offered military assistance to support the new government, which has won Western backing.
Netanyahu, who is up for re-election this year, was criticized domestically by allies and opponents for failing to prevent Turkish and Qatari influence in Gaza.
“The countries that breathed life into Hamas cannot be the ones to replace it,” wrote Israel’s finance minister and far-right ally of Netanyahu, Bezalel Smotrich, in an X post on Saturday. “The prime minister is required to stand firm on this even if it demands managing a dispute with our great ally and President Trump’s envoys.”
The Gaza Executive Board is meant to act as the intermediary between a Palestinian technocratic government, whose members were announced last week, and the Board of Peace, a 12-member committee led by Trump that will set policy for Gaza, and potentially other conflicts as well.
The members of the Board of Peace haven’t yet been announced, though Trump has said it would include heads of state. The leaders of Turkey, Egypt, Canada and Argentina have confirmed receiving invitations to join the board.
The Board of Peace is expected to be involved in overseeing the disarmament of Hamas, according to a person familiar with the matter. But what that looks like isn’t clearly laid out in the Trump plan. Hamas has agreed to give up its large arms, such as its rocket arsenal and antitank missiles, but has so far rebuffed Israel’s demand to give up its small arms. Netanyahu has said that Hamas has around 60,000 automatic guns, and that the group must give them up as part of any disarmament.
The inclusion of Qatari and Turkish officials to the Executive Board shows that the U.S. and Israel aren’t fully coordinated on the plan for Gaza’s future. Analysts say the decision to include the two Israeli rivals will create a battle of influence over Trump and his peace plan for Gaza, which is short on details.
“At the end of the day, it will be about who will succeed in winning to convince Trump about disarmament,” said Ofer Guterman, a senior researcher at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies.