CNN

Watch Obama advisor David Axelrod on John King's new show, State of the Union.

(CNN) - Hours after Israel and Hamas both said they would abide by a fragile cease-fire in Gaza, top Obama advisor David Axelrod told CNN’s John King Sunday to expect the president-elect to take diplomatic action worldwide “early and aggressively” after he’s sworn in, using career diplomats and special envoys.

“I think that the events around the world demand that he act quickly, and I think you'll see him act quickly,” he said in an appearance on State of the Union.

Watch John King's interview with David Axelrod

He also said again that Obama will be meeting with the Joint Chiefs of Staff to “begin an orderly and responsible withdrawal from Iraq. He will be doing many of the other things that you heard him commit to during the campaign.”

Axelrod and other senior Obama advisors have spent the past few weeks in discussions with congressional leadership on the shape of a stimulus package that currently stands at roughly $850 million.

“Well, first of all, let me say I think it's telling that [Obama’s] first acts happened before he was president,” the senior aide told King Sunday. “He came to town two weeks early to begin working on an economic recovery package, because getting this economy moving again is absolutely paramount. And so he is going to continue to work on that.

“Obviously, there are limits to what we can do, but we do have to think boldly right now, that the scope of the emergency we face is so large that economists from the right to the left agree we have to do something big.”

The Obama stimulus plan is currently under consideration in the Senate.