In a meeting on Monday with Jared Kushner, U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law who advises the president on Middle East subjects, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made “very clear, and in no uncertain terms, that he is against a Palestinian state,” according to a senior Israeli official.
Kushner and other visiting Americans didn’t press a Palestinian state, but the prime minister made it “abundantly clear that he is 100% firm on this,” the senior Israeli official told JNS.
The Israeli prime minister made the statement during a discussion about Israel’s red lines.
Netanyahu “made it incredibly clear that this was something that he is against, and the vast majority of Israelis are against,” the Israeli official told JNS. “I think the other side heard the message very well.”
The discussions come as implementation of Trump’s 20-point plan remains stalled over the issue of Hamas’s disarmament. The Jewish state has maintained that the terror group must disarm fully before Israeli forces withdraw and large-scale reconstruction can begin.
Kushner traveled to Israel to meet Netanyahu with members of the Board of Peace, the group Trump created to oversee Gaza’s post-war administration, after Netanyahu publicly rejected a 15-point plan agreed to between the board and Hamas.
In late July, Trump touted the 15-point “road map,” which called for Hamas to be disarmed gradually while Israel withdrew from Gaza in a parallel and phased fashion, as a breakthrough.
Netanyahu rejected the idea categorically on Aug. 9. “I want to be clear here,” the prime minister said at a cabinet meeting. “Israel is ruling out the 15-point document.”
During the four-hour meeting on Monday at Netanyahu’s office, the sides appeared to iron out their differences.
“We will not allow Gaza to be rebuilt until demilitarization occurs,” Kushner told Fox News on Monday. He added that no one wants to send money to a conflict zone “if it’s just going to be taken over by terrorists and blown up again.”
“We’re also not going to restrict Israel’s right to defend itself if there are any imminent threats,” Kushner said.
Netanyahu supported Trump’s 20-point plan to end the Gaza war during a joint press conference at the White House on Sept. 29, 2025.
The plan included a “credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood” once the Palestinian Authority completed a reform program.
Among the reforms was an end to the authority’s pay-for-slay program, which rewards terrorists and their families with stipends.
In a Sept. 30 video statement after the meeting, Netanyahu said that he “absolutely” did not agree to the formation of a Palestinian state.
“One thing we did say, ‘We’re absolutely against a Palestinian state,’” Netanyahu said at the time. “Trump said he understood.”
The prime minister has repeatedly expressed his opposition to a Palestinian state. “Our opposition to a Palestinian state on any territory west of the Jordan River exists, is firm and has not changed in the slightest,” he said at a cabinet meeting in November 2025.
“I have been pushing back against these attempts for decades, doing so against external pressure as well as internal pressure,” Netanyahu said at the time. “So I don’t need encouragement, tweets or lectures from anyone.”
