Israel rejected an offer made by Hamas through Qatari and Egyptian mediators on a new hostage deal, Axios reported on Monday.
Citing unnamed Israeli officials, the report said Israel received the offer on Sunday and conveyed that it was “unacceptable” the following day. The proposal included a three-phase process that would have started with Israel beginning to pull its forces from Gaza and Hamas releasing 40 hostages.
The proposed deal would have ended the Israeli onslaught on Gaza and the war altogether once the final phase was implemented, which would have involved Hamas releasing all the Israeli military personnel they had captive. But Israeli officials have vowed the assault on Gaza will continue through the entire year of 2024.
“The proposal we received from Hamas on Sunday was totally off base and we asked the mediators to try and produce a more acceptable proposal. They are working on it and let’s see what happens,” one Israeli official said.
While Israel rejected the deal, Israeli officials said the proposal showed Hamas is willing to negotiate despite previously saying there would be no talks until a full ceasefire.
But successful negotiations became much less likely on Tuesday as an apparent Israel dramatically escalated tensions in the region by launching a drone strike in Beirut and killing a senior Hamas official, Saleh al-Arouri, who was a key figure in the deal that led to the release of over 100 Israeli hostages and over 200 Palestinian prisoners.
