From the Liveblog of
Sunday, September 8, 2024
Report: Biden doesn’t want to reward Hamas with more concessions after hostage executions
US President Joe Biden is hesitant to reward Hamas with further concessions in a potential hostage-ceasefire deal after the terror group murdered six Israel hostages in Gaza late last month, the Walla news site reports, citing American officials.
According to the report by Israeli journalist Barak Ravid, the White House has recently been reassessing its strategy for ongoing negotiations to secure a ceasefire in Gaza and a deal for the release of the remaining hostages kidnapped by Hamas on October 7.
The report comes after CIA Director Bill Burns said last week that a new hostage-ceasefire proposal was being finalized and would likely be presented within days, and an Israeli official told The Times of Israel yesterday that it was “absolutely possible” that Israel would soon receive a new US proposal.
But the senior US officials quoted by Walla claim the move is not likely to happen immediately.
Some of Biden’s senior advisers are debating whether there is any point in presenting a new proposal when the gaps between Hamas and Israel appear to be growing, according to US officials quoted in the report.
The officials cite the executions of six Israeli hostages — Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, Eden Yerushalmi, 24, Ori Danino, 25, Alex Lobanov, 32, Carmel Gat, 40, and Almog Sarusi, 27 — and Hamas’s reported demand that terrorists serving life sentences be released for civilian hostages in the first stage of a deal as the reasons for the American skepticism that the negotiations are likely to bear fruit.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s press conferences last week, in which he reiterated his demand to maintain full Israeli control along the Philadelphi Corridor on the Egypt-Gaza border, also stirred frustration in the White House, according to the report.
It is believed that 97 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 33 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas released 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November, and four hostages were released before that. Eight hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 37 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the military as they tried to escape their captors.
