Kurt Volker to Newsmax: Hamas Won't Agree to End Gaza Presence

Hamas likely won't ever agree to a deal that ends its presence in Gaza, even with President Donald Trump's upcoming meeting at the White House Monday with Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu, former U.S. Ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker told Newsmax, Sunday.

"They may accept a pause in fighting, a ceasefire, but they're going to insist that they remain in Gaza and that they have some means of exercising power there," said Volker, who appeared on Newsmax's "Sunday Report" with retired U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Blaine Holt.

He and Holt agreed that Trump and Netanyahu will likely discuss how they envision an end state for the hostilities.

"President Trump clearly wants the killing to end," said Volker. "He wants the fighting to stop. But in order to do that, you've got to give Israel a sense that there will not be a return to terrorism coming from Hamas and trying to eliminate Israel."

Volker added that he thinks the two leaders will speak about the state of Iran's nuclear program after Trump ordered military strikes on three of its major facilities in June.

"I think they are both going to want to make sure that this 12-day war actually achieved the objective of getting rid of that program," said Volker.

Holt, meanwhile, said he thinks Trump and Netanyahu will try to find alignment.

"The president wants a ceasefire," he said. "He wants a hostage deal."

Netanyahu is under pressure to "finish off Hamas," Holt added.

Meanwhile, Holt said there will ever be a full assessment on the damages done to Iran's nuclear sites until there are inspectors on the ground.

"The Pentagon has released that they believe they set the program back one to two years," he said. "I'm going to speculate and say it was quite a bit more than that, but I'm very pleased to hear them put that estimate out there."

Holt and Volker also discussed the ongoing situation between Russia and Ukraine, including Ukraine's need for missiles to defend itself against Russia.

Holt said that Trump is sending a message to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, saying that there is not an infinite supply of weapons and money, so the strategy must be to reach an end game in the war.

The Ukrainian request for missiles is valid, said Holt, but "we don't have 10 Patriot batteries right now to give them. It would take years. So we've got to find an alternate method to get this thing closed out."

Volker pointed out that Russia is not only launching drones but also rapid missiles that can get past the Ukrainians' existing air defenses."

"That's why the Patriots are so important," he said. "It's a question of prioritization. We can advance some sales to Ukraine ahead of some other countries. If we want to do that, we can make some deployments from where Patriots are currently deployed, because we know they're going to be taking out Russian missiles, which saves us having to do that later."

But Russian President Vladimir Putin is rejecting Trump's calls for peace, so "there needs to be consequences for that," said Volker.

"President Trump doesn't like being blown off the way he's being blown off by Putin right now, so I hope that we see a strengthening of both sanctions against Russia and some real support for Ukraine, he added.

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