Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Qatari and Egyptian officials that Israeli officials will not engage in another round of talks until Hamas provides a full list of living Israeli hostages in Gaza. This news is a blow to President Joe Biden, who predicted a deal would be done as soon as next week.
On Friday, Axios reported, “Israel made it clear to Egypt and Qatar that it will not hold another round of talks until Hamas presents a list of the hostages who are alive.” Israeli officials said, “There is no point in starting another round of talks until we receive the lists of which of the hostages are alive and until Hamas gives its answer regarding the ‘ratio’ that defines how many prisoners will be released for each hostage.”
The announcement is a setback for the White House, which has been working to ink a hostage deal that includes a pause in fighting and additional aid shipments for Gaza. Last week, the US, Qatar, and Egypt rolled out a new hostage proposal, claiming progress was being made towards a deal.
The deal that’s on the table would involve Hamas releasing 40 Israeli hostages in exchange for a six-week ceasefire and the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. The deal is likely a non-starter for Hamas as its top demand is reaching a permanent ceasefire.
Netanyahu has indicated Israel is unwilling to agree to a lasting end to the fighting. A week ago, he explained that any hostage deal with Hamas would only “delay” the Israeli military operations in Rafah.
Earlier this week, President Biden predicted that the deal would be accepted by both sides on Monday. Hamas and Israeli officials responded to the president’s remarks by saying he spoke too soon. On Thursday, he was forced to walk back that statement, saying “I was on the telephone with the people in the region. I’m still — probably not by Monday, but I’m hopeful.”
As the Israeli onslaught in Gaza has killed tens of thousands of civilians and created a humanitarian crisis, Biden has faced mounting criticism for his unfettered support for Tel Aviv. The White House attempted to divert the attack by claiming that it is focused on reaching a hostage deal and temporary pause in fighting. The Biden administration has cited that as an excuse for refusing to issue condemnations of Israel or call for a ceasefire.
Kyle Anzalone is the opinion editor of Antiwar.com, news editor of the Libertarian Institute, and co-host of Conflicts of Interest.
Clearly a variable in Netanyahu’s survival calculation is the probability of Trump 2024 🙂
I don’t know about that. Trump was pissed at Netanyahu for calling and congratulating Biden on his 2020 victory. Trump carries grudges as we all well know.
Yes a good point and yes, lol, we do 🙂 But he’s also a big family guy and still has a Zionist at family table, one who got a lot of good press for the Abraham accords.
Yes, those “Abraham accords” sure have borne much fruit on the ground.
They were bearing fruit, the Saudis w/in a couple weeks of signing. All in deep cold storage now, along with the Ben-Gurion Canal.
Yes, poisoned fruit.
Oh yes, bountiful fruit. /s
But Mary, A little ass kissing, and the Don will be good with Bibi. They’re like brothers from different mothers.
Right you are Wars!
Like a lot of people, Netanyahoo wrote Donald Trump off after the 2020 election. He should have never burnt that bridge. I’m sure he is already regretting it.
Netanyahoo congratulated Biden on his win sooner than Trump thought he should and said so, then the press tracked down every leader who called and when making a bigger deal than it was – Putin & Zi were in the late group 🙂
What little base Bibi has, ie those non-setter right wingers that don’t want to throw him in jail post war, think Biden’s US is not doing enough and want Trump back. And Bibi’s making a grand fool of Biden on the world stage, not suggesting a path to good graces, just that it certainly doesn’t help Biden’s cratering election odds. Maybe it improves Bibi’s survival odds, maybe not, we’ll see.
Bibi, Ben-Gvir, Smotrich. Having a good laugh, all right.
Speaking of animals …. 🙂
He does not give a sh*t who is POTUS. AIPAC, the Israeli PR, would control the dialog. Sticks and stones (real deterrence) may hurt, but words will never hurt. It is all we hurl at Israel…words. Which should have stopped in 1967 with the attack on the U.S.S. Liberty. G-d D*mn Johnson not doing anything because he “didn’t want to embarrass an ally”. Calling back fighter jets that were on the way to engage.
Big surprise.
Netanyahu has stalled over and over, to keep his Genocide going, to keep decimating Gaza, to keep stealing land, to keep rounding up more Palestinians to arrest, to pound Syria, to pound Lebanon, to do whatever he will do. Only an INSANE person believes anything this RABID DOG says. Believe one thing, he will do whatever he wants and the USA will hold his hand while doing it. This is not going to have a peaceful outcome, because you can NOT trust the DEVIL. America should be ashamed of it’s immoral conduct, it’s complete hypocrisy on human rights, it’s LIES about spreading Freedom, Democracy, blah, blah, blah.
Biden is doing a favor for anyone with a little grey matter left over from the soaps. He’s making it crystal clear that he and his government are in the pockets of the Israelis, the PNAC, and the MIC.
Cannot ignore it. Trump would not be any better. In many ways he would make it worse. Biden may love the Zionist, but he did not move the embassy to Jerusalem.
Land theft is THE game. It has nothing to do with religion. Religion is used as the excuse.
Demand decrease from the release…?!
Hamas should release the names, as well as the names of the hostages who have been killed by IDF bombing.
He doesn’t want them released because that hurts his excuse to bomb.
Even if the rest of the hostages were to be released tomorrow, he will order the bombing, sniper shots, to resume. It is on record that he has said things will not stop until his mission is accomplished. The killing as many Palestinians as possible, moving the rest into the Sinai to die. I trust Netanyahu as much as I would trust a resurrected Hitler.
One wonders if Netanyahoo might be a lot more willing to negotiate a ceasefire if it were his wife, husband, son or daughter being held in Gaza?
IMO, no. I think his depraved cause is the most important thing to him – next to keeping out of prison.
I am just shocked, shocked I tell you!
This was the deal that was being worked on when the US vetoed the temporary cease fire on FEB 20th.
This was why that deal was vetoed:
“Proceeding with a vote today was wishful and irresponsible, and so while we cannot support a resolution that would put sensitive negotiations in jeopardy, we look forward to engaging on a text that we believe will address so many of the concerns we all share,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
This war is a shadow play. Nutty Yahoo wants his cake and to eat it too, and he’s getting even more, as Israel always does. FDR enticed Japan to Pearl Harbor the same way Nutty Yahoo enticed(directed?) Hamas towards October 7. Certainly, there are degrees of FALSE FLAG in each event, though the perpetrators were in plain sight. The background events and closed-door machinations will be left for us all to ponder. The aim of O7 was to provide Israel with a “justification” to obliterate Gaza. Now who benefits by O7, has the means to abet it and the mechanisms to cover up hidden information?
How could the Mossad, Shin Bet, spies on the ground in the occupied territories, U.S. listening posts in Cyprus and other areas not know what was coming? In the months prior to the breakout, Israel let the settlers and the IDF loose, going through neighborhoods, causing h*ll on earth. It was all to stir the pot. It could not happen without the backing of a powerful nation. We are that nation. So it goes.
Talking about rolling, sludging sh*t. “Sensitive negotiations”. Wow. Negotiations would start tomorrow if Biden were to order the cessation of all support for the genocide. No weapons = end of the line.
Moving the goal posts is a constant Israeli tactic, and it works because the US lets it work.
Reminds me of Ross Perot describing how the Japanese inspected American lettuce by letting sit in the sun until it wilts. The POW hostages are the lettuce and Netanyahu doesn’t seem to want them alive.
Along with trip wires in every “agreement” that will allow them to abrogate the agreement.
How convenient, now they can push them into Sinai at gunpoint and just kill the rest of them. The IDF isn’t building that new road for the Palestinians to use.
Hannibal
directive – the Likud doesn’t want the POWs released. I Likud wants the POWs dead.
The time has come to question the wisdom of a Jewish state in the Middle East and indeed anywhere!
The time has come to question the wisdom of any state anywhere.
While ethno-states are particularly bad, it’s pretty much the difference between liver cancer and pancreatic cancer.
Maybe, but Maslow’s hierarchy didn’t include the personality disorders.
There’s no wisdom to begin with… Let alone question it…!
I just watched a report by CNN. First, the reporter went to the warehouses in Jordan where humanitarian supplies are kept before shipment. There was enough to fill 1000 trucks. Sitting there. Israel restricts nearly everything. On the list to be excluded is anesthesia, other medicines, tent poles. Just sitting in that warehouse. CNN then showed the desperation of the Palestinians at the point where they were fired on (some military and police experts believe the IDF “kettled” them to be shot at, like a turkey shoot), a surgeon about to amputate his daughter’s leg, without anesthesia. On and on. Of course, COGAT, then entity that controls the areas in Gaza and the West Bank (which assigns areas by number much like what the NAZI regime did where Jews would be assigned for emigration that did not happen except for a very few who did manage to get out, the many that didn’t, referred to the report as being lies. I am reading Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on The Banality of Evil, by Hannah Arendt. I have read other texts. Her’s is a crucial read. What COGAT is and does is creepily like what the NAZIs did.