Hamas announced this Wednesday that talks in Cairo have ended and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has returned to the starting point.
This is reported by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, also citing an Israeli source, according to which “no progress has been made” in the negotiations, although the Israeli delegation remains in the Egyptian capital.
A lot at stake
The fate of Rafah, in southern Gaza, which Israel has promised to invade, and that of the Israeli hostages held by Hamas are at stake in these negotiations in the Egyptian capital, but both Israel and the Islamist group They are inflexible in their positions.
A senior Hamas official told AFP on Wednesday that his movement “insists on the legitimate demands of his people” and assured that it is a “decisive round.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged his delegation to “stand firm on the conditions necessary for the release” of the hostages.
These negotiations represent “the last chance for Netanyahu and for the families” of the hostages “to see their children return,” Hamas had said on Tuesday.
Until now, only a one-week truce in November managed to stop the conflict that broke out on October 7 due to the attack by Hamas, considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union.
Islamist commandos infiltrated southern Israel that day, killing 1,170 people and kidnapping about 250, according to an AFP count based on Israeli data.
Israel estimates that, after an exchange of hostages for Palestinian prisoners in that November truce, 128 people remain captive in Gazaof which 36 are feared dead.
Israel launched a retaliatory offensive that has already left 34,844 dead in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Ministry of Health of the territory governed since 2007 by Hamas.
The Islamist group accepted the last proposal presented by the mediators, but Netanyahu’s office assured that it was “very far” from its demands and decided to continue “the operation in Rafah to exert military pressure on Hamas.”
What does the ceasefire proposal say?
According to Jalil al Hayya, a senior official in the Islamist movement, The current proposal contemplates three phases of 42 days each.
The proposal includes a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Stripthe return of the displaced and an exchange of hostages for Palestinian prisoners, with the aim of a “permanent ceasefire.”
But Israele opposes a complete withdrawal from Gaza and a permanent ceasefire without first defeating Hamas which, according to its army, has its last battalions in Rafah.
