‘Get Rid Of’ Hamas

US President Donald Trump declared Friday that Hamas isn’t interested in reaching a hostage deal and signaled backing for Israel advancing its military operations against the terror group.

“Hamas didn’t really want to make a deal. I think they want to die,” Trump told reporters outside the White House a day after the US and Israel announced that they were pulling their respective negotiating teams from Doha, where proximity talks with Hamas had been taking place for nearly three weeks.

Washington and Jerusalem fumed at Hamas over the response it submitted earlier Thursday to the latest proposal for a 60-day Gaza truce and hostage release deal. Egypt and Qatar took a more nuanced approach, arguing that the response indeed contained too many requests for changes to the proposal. However, they maintain that the gaps were bridgeable, an Arab diplomat and a source involved in the mediation effort told The Times of Israel on Friday.

Trump painted a far more bleak outlook and appeared to even accept that the US may not be able to secure the release of the remaining 50 hostages — 20 of whom are believed to still be alive.

“We got a lot of hostages out,” Trump said. “But when you get down to the last 10 or 20, I don’t think Hamas is going to make a deal because that means they have no protection. And basically that’s what happened.

“I think what’s going to happen is they’re going to be hunted down. It got to a point where [Israel is] going to have to finish the job.”

“They’re going to have to fight, and they’re gonna have to clean it up. You’re gonna have to get rid of it,” he said, acknowledging that the situation is “sort of disappointing.”