WASHINGTON — US President Donald Trump has set Sunday evening as the deadline for Hamas to accept his ceasefire and prisoner swap proposal, describing it as the Palestinian group’s “last chance.”

Trump said Hamas must agree to the deal by 6 p.m. Eastern Time (2200 GMT) on Sunday or face unprecedented military retaliation.

“If it is not consented to by then, all hell, like no one has ever seen before, will break out against Hamas,” Trump wrote Friday on his social media platform, Truth Social.

“As retribution for the October 7th (2023) attack on civilization, more than 25,000 Hamas ‘soldiers’ have already been killed. Most of the rest are surrounded and militarily trapped, just waiting for me to give the word, ‘go,’ for their lives to be quickly extinguished,” he added.

The president said US and Israeli forces would target remaining Hamas members directly, warning: “We know where and who you are, and you will be hunted down, and killed.”

Trump also urged Palestinian civilians to leave unspecified areas of Gaza, which he described as “potentially [facing] great future death,” promising they would be cared for in safer locations.

The ultimatum comes as Israel intensifies its campaign in Gaza City. The United Nations reported Thursday that more than 417,000 people have been displaced from northern Gaza since mid-August, with humanitarian conditions worsening in the south.

UN relief chief Tom Fletcher said on X that “fighting continues in Gaza City. Access to the north is difficult. Need for unimpeded humanitarian effort, but many humanitarians forced to suspend ops.”

He stressed that displacement orders “do not absolve parties to conflict from responsibilities: many civilians remain and must be protected.”

Gaza, home to nearly 2.4 million people, has been under an Israeli blockade for nearly 18 years.

The siege was tightened in March when border crossings were closed and food and medicine deliveries blocked, driving the enclave deeper into famine.

Since October 2023, Israeli bombardment has killed nearly 66,300 Palestinians, most of them women and children, according to UN figures. Aid groups warn the enclave is being rendered uninhabitable as starvation and disease spread amid mass displacement. — Agencies