Hopes of an agreement between Israel and Hamas have been reopened after the plan announced on Friday by American President Joe Biden (presented as an Israeli proposal). Egypt made it known that Hamas, according to what emerged from “preliminary statements”, had “positively welcomed” the proposal. Although Hamas sources told the Haaretz newspaper that the group has informed mediators from Qatar and Egypt that it is asking for an official guarantee from the United States, in particular on a lasting ceasefire.
As for Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finds himself at a crossroads: accepting the US proposal would allow us to exit the war and bring the hostages home, but it could also cause the government coalition to implode, potentially sending the prime minister into opposition; rejecting the agreement, however, could worsen Israel’s international isolation, worsen ties with the United States and expose Netanyahu to the accusation of abandoning the hostages. Perhaps creating the conditions for accepting the US plan, Netanyahu wanted to clarify that the proposal respects the objective of eliminating Hamas, otherwise Israel reserves “the right to return to war”.
In a closed-door speech held before the Knesset foreign affairs committee and leaked to Israeli media, Netanyahu said there were some “gaps” in Biden’s announcement. «Biden spoke of the general lines but not of all the details» and in the plan there are integrated measures to guarantee that all parties respect the agreement before moving on to the next phase, said the Israeli prime minister, according to whom «the war it will be stopped for the return of the hostages and then we will proceed with the discussion.”
In the efforts to bring back the hostages “we have maintained the objectives of the war, first and foremost the destruction of Hamas”, “that is part of the proposal”, Netanyahu later said in a video statement released by his office. And again: “The claim that we agreed to a ceasefire without our conditions being met is not true.” In his speech on Friday, Biden appeared to offer Netanyahu a way out: claim victory by saying that the battered Hamas can no longer launch an attack similar to the one on October 7, bring home all the hostages and then work with the United States and Arab countries to build a new regional security architecture.
“The proposal on the table is almost identical to the one that Hamas said it wanted to accept just a few weeks ago, and it’s time for them to act,” is the position coming from the US through State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller. Meanwhile, the IDF has confirmed the death of 4 Israeli hostages held captive by Hamas, after obtaining new intelligence information. They are Chaim Peri, 79 years old, Amiram Cooper, 84 years old, Yoram Metzger, 80 years old, and Nadav Popplewell, 51 years old, who reportedly died several months ago. News arrived on the same day in which the army also announced that the remains of a young man who was believed to be a hostage, 35-year-old Dolev Yehud, had been identified in Kibbutz Nir Oz.
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