GAZA  (JNS) – Hamas will not lay down its weapons until Israel is “eliminated,” Osama Hamdan, a senior official in the terror organization, vowed on Wednesday.

“We have been very clear with mediators, and in our messages passed on to the relevant parties, that the matter of Palestinian weapons is linked to the presence or elimination of the occupation,” stated Hamdan, referencing Israel in an interview with Al Jazeera.

“To this day, the Palestinian national motto states that the occupation needs to be eliminated,” he stated. “The weapons are legal according to international law, and by virtue of the will of the Palestinian people, so these weapons will not be laid down until their goal is achieved.”

Hamas’s official charter calls for the destruction of the State of Israel and refers to parts of the Quran that call for Muslims to kill Jews everywhere.

However, Hamdan said, “if the establishment of a Palestinian state is in the cards, it is possible to have some kind of agreement on a hudna,” or a temporary truce, which according to Islamic doctrine can be used to rebuild, rearm and prepare for future hostilities.

During this hudna, “all relevant parties will enable the Palestinians to establish their independent state,” he explained. “This state will be allowed to fulfill its duty of defending its people, land and rights. Then, I believe that the Palestinians as a whole will have their own military, armed forces and security agencies,” the top terrorist said.

U.S. President Donald Trump warned on Jan. 21 that the terror group would be “blown away very quickly” if it fails to lay down its weapons under the second phase of his administration’s peace plan for Gaza.

Speaking at a question-and-answer session in Davos, Switzerland, after his address to the World Economic Forum, the president said Hamas had “agreed to give up their weapons” as part of his 20-point plan.

Phase 2 of the plan calls for Hamas to lay down its arms with the deployment of an International Stabilization Force to the Strip.

Hamdan told Al Jazeera on Wednesday that “the last thing the world should contemplate is sending forces to replace the occupation and clash with the Palestinians on behalf of the occupation.

“No Palestinian will accept this,” he added, noting that since the United Nations Security Council voted to adopt Trump’s plan for international forces, these countries “should deploy at the borders and prevent the enemy [Israel] from going back to its aggression against our people.”

Several of Hamas’s top leaders, including Khaled Mashaal and Musa Abu Marzouk, have publicly rebuffed key parts of Trump’s proposals.

“As long as our people are under occupation,” Mashaal told Al Jazeera earlier this week, “disarmament is an attempt to turn our people into victims, make their elimination easier and facilitate their destruction.”

“Questions about the resistance’s weapons are being raised forcefully. Some want to place it in the context that whoever carried out Oct. 7 must be cornered and made to pay the price,” he said, in reference to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of 1,200 people.

“As those who participated in the resistance, we must not accept this,” he declared, saying that “resistance is the right of occupied peoples.”

Abu Marzouk told the Qatari outlet on Jan. 28 that Hamas never agreed to disarm. “Not for a single moment did we talk about surrendering weapons,” he said, claiming the issue was never raised in the talks.

The United States is demanding that Hamas give up all weapons capable of being used to attack Israel, but will allow them to keep small arms, at least at first, according to sources cited by The New York Times on Tuesday.

The report, which cited anonymous officials, said draft plans envisioned phased disarmament, which is expected to take “months or longer” to be carried out.

It was not immediately clear who would take possession of the weapons Hamas was to hand over or how the disarmament would be completed.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the Knesset on Jan. 26 that Phase 2 does not entail Gaza’s reconstruction, but demilitarization.

According to the prime minister, demilitarization “will happen—as our friend Trump said—the easy way or the hard way, but it will happen.”