U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.

i24 News – US President Donald Trump on Friday said the Palestinian jihadists of Hamas did not want to make a deal on a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza.

“Now we’re down to the final hostages, and they know what happens after you get the final hostages. And basically because of that, they really didn’t want to make a deal,” Trump said.

The comments followed statements by Middle East peace envoy Steve Witkoff and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the effect that Israel was now considering “alternative” options to achieve its goals of bringing its hostages home from Gaza and ending the terror rule of Hamas in the coastal enclave.

Trump added he believed Hamas leaders would now be “hunted down.”

On Thursday, Witkoff said the Trump administration had decided to bring its negotiating team home for consultations following Hamas’s latest proposal. Witkoff said overnight that Hamas was to blame for the impasse, with Netanyahu concurring.

Trump also dismissed the significance of French President Emmanuel Macron’s announcement that Paris would become the first major Western power to recognize an independent Palestinian state.

Macron’s comments, “didn’t carry any weight,” the US leader said.