President Donald Trump indicated that a peace deal between Israel and Hamas could be developing quickly, after Secretary of State Marco Rubio was seen passing him a note during a roundtable Wednesday afternoon.
Shortly after receiving the handwritten message from Rubio, and a brief conversation between the pair, Trump announced that he was “just given a note by the Secretary of State saying that we’re very close to a deal in the Middle East, and they’ll get to need me pretty quickly.”
The note, captured in a photo by the Associated Press, read, “very close. We need you to approve a Truth Social post soon so you can announce deal first.”
The development came during an East Wing roundtable on antifa event, where Trump said at the top of his remarks that he may be visiting the Middle East “by the end of the week, maybe on Sunday.”
“Probably on Sunday, maybe Saturday, maybe a little later than Saturday evening,” he said at the time.
Trump also told reporters he had been on the telephone with his representatives in Egypt, including Middle East special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner, for final negotiations with Hamas.
When asked where he would be visiting, the president said he would “most likely” be headed to Egypt.
Trump added “there’s a very good chance” of reaching an agreement to end the war in Gaza, more than two years after Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel and Israel Defense Forces ground operations in response in the enclave.
“Peace for the Middle East,” he said. “It’s a beautiful phrase, and we hope it’s going to come true, but it’s very close, and they’re doing very well. We have a great team over there, great negotiators. And there [are] unfortunately, great negotiators on the other side also, but it’s something I think that will happen, got a good chance of happening.”
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Rubio similarly projected confidence on Capitol Hill, telling reporters that “good progress has been made today.”
“Events are moving in a good direction, but there’s still some work to be done,” Rubio said.