Prospects for a ceasefire in Gaza appeared to be receding on Monday as Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, expressed doubt over a deal in a meeting with hostage families, and Hamas accused Israel and the US of abandoning past agreements.
Mr Netanyahu told members of the Tikva forum, a hardline alternative to the main hostage representative group, that he was “not sure there will be a deal” and that Israeli troops would not withdraw from the Netzarim Corridor through central Gaza or the Philadelphi Corridor at border between Gaza and Egypt “under any circumstances.”
The US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, was in Egypt on Monday where indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas are ongoing. The US has presented what it calls a “bridging proposal” in the hope of sealing an agreement to end fighting in Gaza and secure the release of hostages as soon as this week, without revealing details of the terms.
Egyptian media reported that Cairo has dropped a demand for a date for Israeli withdrawal from the Philadelphi Corridor if Israel agrees to reduce its presence and commit to withdrawal “as soon as possible.”
Mr Blinken and President Joe Biden had characterised Hamas as the major obstacle to a deal, with the president accusing the militant group of “backing off” in a speech at the Democrat National Convention.
Hamas rejected the charge as “misleading” and said the new deal abandoned previous terms set out by the US in July, which included several phases of ceasefire and prisoner exchanges.
“The proposal recently presented to us goes against what the parties had agreed on 2 July, this is considered an American response and acquiescence to the terrorist Netanyahu’s new conditions and his criminal plans towards the Gaza Strip”, the group said in a statement.
Mr Netanyahu, who has repeatedly said that Israel will fight until Hamas is destroyed, also came under domestic pressure to agree a deal on Monday after the bodies of six hostages were retrieved from Gaza.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main group representing captives, said the prime minister was “effectively torpedoing the hostage deal,” adding “abandoning the hostages leads to their being murdered”.
Opposition leader, Yair Lapid, said: “All of Netanyahu’s attempts to sabotage the negotiations should stop. A deal now, before they all die.”
Yossi Mekelberg, a Middle East analyst at Chatham House, said the leaders of both sides were stalling on a deal and should be coerced by mediators.
“Both sides need this deal quite desperately but it doesn’t seem that their leaderships see it that way,” he said, suggesting both Netanyahu and Hamas chief, Yahya Sinwar, are “more interested in their own survival.”
“It calls for the mediators to exert their influence on both sides, to be honest to say: ‘enough, this is what the international community wants.’ And if not, there are measures to make them do it.”
Amos Yadlin, former head of Israel’s military intelligence department, also suggested that neither leader supported a truce, predicting the war would end “not before Sinwar sees his hope of a regional war is gone, or Sinwar’s assassination.”
Netanyahu would be more willing to agree a ceasefire if Sinwar were killed, said Yadlin, who Israel considers to be the mastermind of the deadly raids on 7 October.
Hugh Lovatt, a Middle East analyst at the European Council on Foreign Relations, suggested that US mediation had failed.
“Fundamentally talks remain stuck,” he told i. “Lots of noise but not going anywhere so far. Rather than Israel-Hamas talks, we have had Israel-US talks. And rather than a genuine bridging proposal to close gaps…it looks like the US has accepted Netanyahu’s new conditions which he tabled to undermine talks with Hamas.”
Iran had said it would wait for the outcome of talks to respond to the assassination of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last month, attributed to Israel.
But a spokesperson for the Tehran regime said on Monday “the waiting period for this response could be long.”
At least 10 Palestinians were killed by an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering refugees near Gaza City, according to local officials. More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed during the war, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, whose data has been deemed reliable by the UN.
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