‘Cabinet empowered PM, DM to accept ceasefire without vote’

Addressing rumors that much to the cabinet’s discontent, the current truce was accepted without a vote by ministers, Netanyahu says the cabinet backed the Egyptian ceasefire proposal from the start.

Later, the cabinet voted to authorize the prime minister and defense minister to accept ceasefires on their own, without a cabinet vote, he says.

If there is a long-term arrangement, “that will be brought to the cabinet, he says. But he casts doubt on that prospect. “It’s not clear there will be” a long-term negotiated deal. “The talks will start in a month,” he says, indicating that anything could happen with those talks.

The fact is, he reiterates, “Hamas abandoned all its demands” and signed an open-ended ceasefire “without preconditions.”

“I thought it right to accept that.”