Hamas has stated that Israel seeks to draw out the negotiations and use them to 'provide cover' for its army to 'perpetuate the war of genocide' against Palestinians in Gaza
News Desk - The Cradle
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An official source in the movement told Al-Sharq that the US proposal included reducing the presence of the Israeli army on the strategic Gaza–Egypt border area known as the Philadelphi Corridor but not a full withdrawal of the Israeli army. The proposal also included the returning management of the Rafah crossing to the Palestinian Authority (PA) under Israeli supervision.
The source added that the US proposal also includes allowing Israel to monitor displaced Palestinians at the Netzarim Corridor as they return to the north of Gaza.
Washington’s proposal also includes deporting outside of Palestine a large number of Palestinian prisoners who will be released by Israel in the exchange deal, according to a source in the Hamas movement.
The source also pointed out that the proposal gives Tel Aviv the right to refuse the release of at least 100 Palestinian prisoners now held in Israeli prisons in any exchange for the remaining Israeli captives held by Hamas.
The US proposal additionally 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.
He explained that according to the proposal, an agreement on the reconstruction of Gaza and lifting the 17-year blockade on the enclave would be discussed only after the implementation of the deal’s first phase.
The US proposal comes as Israel continues to carry out regular massacres of women and children in Gaza and amid reports that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking to sabotage a possible ceasefire deal.
Documents cited by the New York Times (NYT) on 13 August confirmed that Netanyahu has continued to add new conditions to Israel’s demands each time a deal for a ceasefire is close to being reached.
The unpublished documents show that Israel “relayed a list of new stipulations in late July to American, Egyptian, and Qatari mediators that added less flexible conditions to a set of principles it had made in late May,” NYT reported.
It added that the documents “make clear that the behind-the-scenes maneuvering by the Netanyahu government has been extensive.”
Hamas has stated that Netanyahu continues to delay a ceasefire agreement to give the Israeli army more time to kill Palestinians and destroy homes and infrastructure in Gaza. The resistance movement called in a statement on 12 August for mediators to push Israel into accepting the proposal it had agreed to in early July, which was an updated version of Biden’s May proposal.
“We demand that the mediators submit a plan to implement what they presented to the movement and that we agreed to on 2 July 2024, based on Biden’s vision and the Security Council resolution, and oblige the occupation to do so, instead of going to more rounds of negotiations or new proposals that provide cover for the occupation’s aggression and give it more time to perpetuate the war of genocide against our people,” Hamas said on 11 August.
This week, the number of Palestinians killed by Israel in Gaza exceeded 40,000, according to the health ministry. The number may be much higher due to indirect deaths from the destruction of Gaza’s health and sanitation infrastructure and due to those people who remain missing, buried under the rubble of buildings and homes destroyed by Israeli bombs.
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