Hamas calls out US 'bridging proposal' for Gaza ceasefire: 'Not what we agreed to'

The US-backed proposal includes new conditions imposed by Israel’s prime minister which are unacceptable to Hamas

News Desk - The Cradle

Hamas leader Osama Hamdan criticized a statement made by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, calling on the resistance movement to accept a “bridging proposal” for a Gaza ceasefire being discussed by mediators.

Blinken’s statement “raises many ambiguities” because it is “not what was presented to us nor what we agreed on,” Hamdan told Reuters late on 19 August.

Hamdan added that Hamas has told mediators it does not “need new Gaza ceasefire negotiations; we need to agree on an implementation mechanism.”

“We only agreed to the proposal presented by [US President Joe] Biden, and the US administration failed to convince Netanyahu of it. The Israelis have backed down from issues included in Biden's proposal,” Hamdan said in a separate interview with Al Jazeera on Monday night. Talk about Netanyahu agreeing to an updated proposal means that the US administration failed to convince him of the [initial] agreement. All the American side is doing is just buying time for the genocide to continue. We only want to implement President the Biden proposal that we agreed to. We do not know the exact updated proposal being discussed, but the Israeli delegation that went to Doha presented conditions that violate it,” he added.

US President Joe Biden accused Hamas on Tuesday of “backing away” from a ceasefire deal. 

Hamas responded in an official statement saying Biden and Blinken’s remarks resulted in “great astonishment and disapproval,” calling them “misleading” and a “renewed US greenlight for [Israel] to commit more crimes.” 

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) also said in a statement on Tuesday that Blinken “gave the Israeli occupation government a new mandate to complete the aggression and genocidal war against the Gaza Strip.”

At a press conference in Tel Aviv on Monday, Blinken said he had a “very constructive meeting” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

The prime minister “confirmed to me that Israel accepts the bridging proposal [reached by mediators in the Qatar talks last week] to try to bridge the gaps that remain between the parties.”

“He supports it. It’s now incumbent on Hamas to do the same. The next important step is for Hamas to say yes, and then, in the coming days, for all of the expert negotiators to work on clear understandings on implementing the agreement,” Blinken added. 

Mossad chief David Barnea, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, and General Nitzan Alon – members of Israel’s negotiating team – told Netanyahu that reaching a deal is not possible under his current positions, according to Israeli officials cited by Axios on 19 August. 

Biden unveiled a permanent ceasefire plan in late May, claiming Israel had also agreed to the proposal. Yet Netanyahu called the proposal “incomplete” and remained insistent on having a right to continue the war and pursue Hamas after the captives’ exchange.

US and Qatari mediators eventually updated the Biden plan and presented it to Hamas in early July. The resistance movement proposed amendments to the revised plan on 3 July, which Israeli sources said were positive and could enable a deal to pass.

However, the premier’s position on pursuing the war’s goals, despite talks for a permanent ceasefire, obstructed the negotiations and prevented an agreement from being reached.

The proposal being discussed now is a further updated version of the July plan, which includes new conditions imposed by Netanyahu, including a screening mechanism for displaced Gazans who would return to the northern strip as part of an agreement, according to a Hamas source who spoke with Al-Sharq newspaper on 18 August. 

According to the source, the new US-backed proposal also includes deporting a large number of Palestinian prisoners and “reducing” the number of Israeli troops on the Gaza–Egypt border’s Philadelphi Corridor and Rafah crossing – from which Hamas had demanded a withdrawal. 

It also does not guarantee a permanent ceasefire. The US proposal states that “a permanent ceasefire will be discussed in the second phase within a specific limit, and if Hamas does not agree to the Israeli demands, the army will return to the war and carry out its military operations,” according to the source.

Hamas, which did not attend last week’s talks, officially rejected the terms reached by mediators in Doha. 

Talks are scheduled to resume in Cairo on Wednesday.