Hamas said Wednesday (January 28, 2026) it was ready to transfer the governance of Gaza to a Palestinian technocratic committee, while insisting the key Rafah border crossing be fully reopened within days.

“Protocols are prepared, files are complete, and committees are in place to oversee the handover, ensuring a complete transfer of governance in the Gaza Strip across all sectors to the technocratic committee,” Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem told AFP.

The 15-member National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG) is a team of Palestinian technocrats created as part of the U.S.-sponsored ceasefire agreement which came into effect on October 10.

It is charged with managing the day-to-day governance of post-war Gaza and will work under the supervision of the “Board of Peace”, which U.S. President Donald Trump will chair.

The NCAG, headed by former Palestinian Authority deputy minister Ali Shaath, is expected to enter the Gaza Strip once the territory’s Rafah crossing, on its border with Egypt, reopens.

Hamas spokesman Qassem added that the Rafah crossing “must be opened in both directions, with full freedom of exit and entry to the Gaza Strip, without any Israeli obstacles”.

Rafah is Gaza’s only gateway to the outside world that does not lead to Israel and is a key entry point for both people and goods.

It has been closed since Israeli forces took control of it in May 2024, except for a limited reopening in early 2025, and other bids to reopen have failed to materialise.

NCAG head Shaath announced last week that Rafah would reopen in both directions the following week.

Mr. Qassem told AFP the “independent national committee’s announcement of the opening of the Rafah crossing is important”.

“What is more important is that we monitor this committee’s handling of citizens’ departures and entries in full freedom in accordance with the agreement, and not according to Israeli conditions,” he added.

Israel has said it would only allow pedestrians to travel through the crossing as part of its “limited reopening” once it had recovered the remains of the last hostage, Ran Gvili.

Israeli forces brought back Gvili’s remains on Monday and his funeral was held in the southern town of Meitar on Wednesday (January 28, 2026).

Mr. Qassem said Wednesday (January 28, 2026) that “it is clear that Hamas is committed to the agreement to stop the war on the Gaza Strip”, which began after the militant group’s deadly attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023.

“It has carried out everything required of it in the first phase and is ready to enter all tracks of the second phase,” he added.

With the technocratic committee’s creation and the last hostage held in Gaza returned to Israel, the ceasefire deal’s next important milestones will be Hamas’s disarmament and Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza.

Though Hamas said the return of Gvili’s body showed its commitment to the ceasefire deal, it has so far not surrendered its weapons.

The group has repeatedly said disarmament is a red line, but it has also suggested it would be open to handing over its weapons to a Palestinian governing authority.

Neither Israel nor Hamas have committed to a clear date or strategy for withdrawal or disarmament.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday (December 19, 2025) that ​a new governance structure for Gaza — made up of an international ‌board and a group of Palestinian technocrats — would be in place ​soon, followed by the deployment of foreign troops, as the U.S. hopes to cement a fragile ceasefire in Israel’s war in the Palestinian enclave.

Mr. Rubio, speaking at a year-end news conference, said the status quo was not sustainable in Gaza, where Israel has continued to strike Hamas targets while the militant group has reasserted its control since the October peace agreement brokered by President Donald Trump’s administration.

“That’s why ​we have a sense of urgency about bringing phase one to its ⁠full completion, which is the establishment of the Board of Peace, and the establishment of the Palestinian technocratic authority or organization that’s going to be on the ground, and then the stabilization force comes ​closely thereafter,” Mr. Rubio said.

Mr. Rubio said progress ⁠had been made recently on identifying Palestinians to join the technocratic group, and said Washington was aiming to get the governance bodies in place “very soon,” without offering a specific timeline.

Mr. Rubio was speaking after U.S. Central Command hosted a conference in ‌Doha this week with partner nations to plan the International Stabilization Force (ISF) ‌for Gaza. Two U.S. officials told Reuters last week that international troops could be deployed in the strip as early as next month, ‍after the U.N. Security Council voted in November to authorize the force.

It remains unclear how Palestinian militant group Hamas will be disarmed and countries considering contributing troops ‍to the ISF are wary that Hamas will engage their soldiers in combat.

Mr. Rubio did not specify who would be responsible for disarming Hamas, and conceded that countries contributing troops want to know what the ISF’s specific mandate is and how it will be funded. “I think we owe them a few more answers before we can ask anybody to firmly commit, but I feel very confident that we have a number of nation states acceptable to all sides in this who are willing to step forward ⁠and be a part of that stabilization force.,” Mr. Rubio said, noting that Pakistan was among the countries who had expressed interest.

Establishing security and ​governance was key to drawing donors to pay for reconstruction in Gaza, Mr. Rubio added.

“Who’s ⁠going to pledge billions of dollars to build things that are going to get blown up again because a war starts?” Mr. Rubio said, discussing the possibility of a donor conference to raise reconstruction funds. “They want to know who’s in charge, and they want to know that there’s security so and ⁠that there’ll be long term stability.”