Trump's envoy Witkoff explains why situation in Ukraine is much more complicated than in Gaza

Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy for the Middle East, compared Ukraine’s ceasefire prospects to Gaza’s in a CBS News interview aired March 16, calling Ukraine’s situation "much more complicated."

"I compare it sometimes to Gaza. Gaza is a finite, defined, space, as compared to where the battle is being fought, in Ukraine, Russia. So this is a much more complicated situation, and yet no one is throwing their hands up in the air," he said. 

The technical challenge is halting combat across a 2,000-kilometer Russia-Ukraine contact line, he explained.

"There's a 2,000 kilometer border between these two countries, and they are shooting each other and facing each other across that border" Witkoff noted.

He outlined a web of issues complicating talks: fighting in Russia’s Kursk Oblast, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant’s status, occupied territories, port access, and a potential Black Sea deal.

"Nor does that include a main area of confrontation, which is Kursk. And so there's different battlefield conditions. We've got to discuss that. There are regions that we all know the Russians are focused on. There is a nuclear reactor that supplies quite a bit of electricity to the country of Ukraine. That's got to be dealt with. There's access to ports. There's the Black Sea potential agreement, there's so many elements," he said.

Witkoff stressed that all parties, "including Europeans," must rally behind U.S. efforts to "get to a successful resolution."

His remarks echo Jeddah talks on March 11, where Secretary of State Marco Rubio flagged territorial concessions, a point Trump expanded on, saying the U.S. discussed with Ukraine "land to keep and lose."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed on March 14 that such trade-offs surfaced in Saudi Arabia, while White House adviser Mike Waltz added on March 16 that security guarantees for Kyiv hinge on territorial giveaways.