Blinken to visit Egypt, Qatar as US pushes Hamas to agree to an amended deal that allows Israel to keep troops in Gaza.
Hamas has said a ceasefire deal must result in a permanent end to Israel’s war on Gaza, accusing the United States of “merely buying time for Israel to continue its genocide” by proposing an amended accord.
As the Palestinian group revealed details of Israel’s new conditions, it urged the world to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to sign the deal proposed by US President Joe Biden on May 31 and backed by the United Nations Security Council on June 11.
“The Israelis have retreated from issues included in Biden’s proposal. Netanyahu’s talk about agreeing to an updated proposal indicates that the US administration has failed to convince him to accept the previous agreement,” Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan told Al Jazeera on Monday.
On Tuesday, Biden said Hamas was “backing away” from the deal agreed to by Israel.
“It’s still in play, but you can’t predict,” he said while leaving the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. “Israel says they can work it out … Hamas is now backing away.”
Hamdan’s comments came after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in Tel Aviv on Monday that he had “a very constructive meeting” with Netanyahu, who “confirmed to me that Israel accepts the bridging proposal“.
“This is a decisive moment – probably the best, maybe the last, opportunity to get the [Israeli] hostages home, to get a ceasefire and to put everyone on a better path to enduring peace and security,” Blinken said.
The Israeli military said on Tuesday that it had recovered the bodies of six captives from Khan Younis in southern Gaza.
The US put forward the latest proposal last week after new talks in Qatar’s capital Doha.
Hamas said the new proposal meets Netanyahu’s conditions, including his refusal of a ceasefire, a complete troop withdrawal from Gaza and his insistence on keeping control of the Netzarim Corridor, which separates the north and the south of the enclave, the Rafah border crossing and the Philadelphi Corridor that borders Egypt.
Blinken left for Egypt’s Mediterranean city of El Alamein on Tuesday for talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi at his summer palace.
He will then head to a meeting in Doha with Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.
Egypt and Qatar are working alongside the US to broker a truce in the 10-month Gaza conflict.
The Biden framework would freeze fighting for an initial six weeks while Israeli captives are exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and humanitarian aid enters Gaza.
Netanyahu said on Monday that negotiators were aiming to “release a maximum number of living hostages” in the first phase of any ceasefire.
At least 40,139 people have been killed and 92,743 wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza, according to the enclave’s Ministry of Health. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7 and more than 200 were taken captive.