PA sources see Hamas trapped by its own demands

Palestinian Authority sources say Hamas political chief Khaled Mashaal has avoided traveling to Cairo to take part in the ceasefire talks.

According to the sources, Mashaal and Hamas are trying to avoid the Egyptian framework for a ceasefire, so Mashaal has not even spoken to Egyptian intelligence officials or Palestinian Authority leaders discussing the ceasefire.

Egypt is insisting that the negotiations over the conditions of the ceasefire must take place only after Hamas stops fighting. Egypt has refused to accept Hamas’s conditions, including the opening of Gaza’s Rafah border crossing with Egypt, as a precondition for the ceasefire, the PA sources tell The Times of Israel.

Egypt has informed Hamas that most of their conditions, particularly those related to Rafah and Gaza’s economic development, are addressed to Cairo, not Jerusalem, and therefore Hamas must end its fighting with Israel before negotiations with Cairo can begin.

The sources believe that Hamas is in a trap, since it cannot end the fighting at this stage without appearing to lose, while its long list of preconditions for the ceasefire have raised expectations among Gazans. If Hamas ends the fighting now, after 260 dead and 2,000 wounded in Gaza, according to Palestinian figures, the Gazan public will accuse it of dragging the beleaguered territory to a pointless, bloody adventure.

This fear has driven many Hamas supporters and fighters in Gaza to insist the organization not stop the fighting at this time.

— Avi Issacharoff