Hamas Rejects New Ceasefire Proposals, Blames Israel

September 5, 2024

by: Itamar Eichner, Daniel Edelson, Lior Ben Ari, Einav Halabi and Niv Shaiovich ~ Ynetnews

Thursday, 5 September 2024 | Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to insist on the Philadelphi Corridor and Hamas rejects an official announcement of “new proposals,” but the Americans are not giving up. The US is expected to present a mediation proposal, the second in less than a month, and are considering submitting the proposal this weekend on Friday or Saturday. However, the US no longer defines it as a “final proposal,” with the understanding that the difficulties are not likely to be resolved soon.

Meanwhile, Hamas in a statement issued overnight between Wednesday and Thursday, rejected any new ceasefire proposals and claimed that Netanyahu’s insistence on staying on the Philadelphi Corridor was intended to thwart a deal. “Pressure must be put on Netanyahu and his government and they must be bound to what was agreed upon,” Hamas said in a statement, “We warn against falling into Netanyahu’s trap and tricks, as he uses negotiations to prolong the aggression against our people.”

The US administration has not yet decided whether President Joe Biden will present the proposal alone or whether it will be presented jointly by the United States and the mediators Qatar and Egypt. Either way, there is a great deal of pessimism among those involved in the negotiations and the feeling that the chances of a deal are very low.

The understanding is that there will be no deal as long as Netanyahu insists on remaining in the Philadelphi Corridor. The US is considering increasing the pressure on Netanyahu to be more flexible under the new proposal and to demand a dramatic decrease in the number of forces in Philadelphi.

But even on the other side, it is not clear if there is a willingness for a deal. An American source told Ynet Wednesday night that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is expected to reject the deal. “But we must continue and try to reach it. We will never give up. We owe it to the hostages,” he emphasized.

At the same time, senior US officials told the Wall Street Journal that the upcoming proposal is expected to be more detailed than the first “mediation proposal” submitted last month. It will include more precise details regarding the exchange of hostages for prisoners, what may lead to a resumption of fighting and how long the Israeli forces can stay in the Philadelphi area. Most of the proposed outline has been agreed upon, according to those senior officials, but they emphasize that Hamas remains the party that refuses to approve it. According to them, the proposed deal gives Hamas most of its demands while Israel made many concessions to reach the deal.

State Department Spokesman Matthew Miller on Wednesday night referred to Netanyahu’s second press conference—this time in English—in which he also elaborated at length on his insistence on maintaining a presence on the Philadelphi Corridor, and claimed that his demand does not contradict the Israeli outline that he himself submitted on May 27.

At the press conference, Netanyahu left an opening for a withdrawal from Philadelphi in the second phase of the deal, though the fact is that in order to reach it another negotiation must be completed on the end of the war with Hamas and the chances of reaching it are slim. Netanyahu said that his demand in such future negotiations would be to have some kind of presence on the route in order to make sure that there would be no smuggling.

“We agreed to thin out the number of soldiers along the corridor. We don’t need an entire division there,” he said, referring to the first phase of the deal. “For 42 days we will stay while drawing down our forces, but we have agreed to start talks on a permanent ceasefire, and our terms must include a situation where the Philadelphi Corridor will be impenetrable. Someone must be there—I don’t care who. Bring someone who will show us not on paper or in words but on the ground, day after day, week after week, that they can prevent a repeat of what happened. We are open to considering it.”

The chances of an agreement being reached for the second stage and the end of the war are already slim. Israel insists that it will be able to resume fighting after the first stage, in which dozens of hostages from the humanitarian categories will be released.

Miller responded to this Wednesday night, saying that in a May proposal, Israel did agree to evacuate from “densely populated areas,” and according to him, this also includes the Philadelphi Corridor. Miller said that reaching a deal “is going to require flexibility from the Government of Israel, just as it’s going to require Hamas to finally find a reason, a way to get to yes. And so we’re going to continue to engage with the Government of Israel on this question. We recognize the very real security needs that Israel has to ensuring that there can’t be smuggling across the Philadelphi Corridor. We think that there are ways to address it. It’s also important that we recognize the very real security imperatives to Israel in reaching a ceasefire that allows us to hopefully reach a diplomatic resolution to the situation on the Israeli–Lebanon border and hopefully helps us calm broader regional tensions, all of which are a threat to Israel’s security.”

Another spokesman for the US State Department, Samuel Warberg, was interviewed at the same time by Sky News in Arabic and said that he could not reveal the efforts that he said were going on behind the scenes: “We cannot force our will on Israel and Hamas to accept the agreement. We are working to free all of the hostages,” he said. He added that both Israel and Hamas do not agree to the agreement so far and that both sides are responsible for this. He also said that the US believes that “Israel is able to defend itself against any attack even without its presence on the Philadelphi Corridor.”

Posted on September 5, 2024

Source: (Excerpt from an article originally published by Ynetnews on September 5, 2024. Time-related language has been modified to reflect our republication today. See original article at this link.)

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