Netanyahu convenes discussion on hostage negotiations with new ceasefire push

As Israel and mediating countries have been working to formulate a new framework for a potential hostage-ceasefire deal in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a security discussion on the issue on Sunday evening.

Egypt has been leading the recent negotiation efforts, and is currently hosting representatives from Hamas, who arrived in Cairo on Saturday for talks with its negotiators.

The renewed talks came after a ceasefire went into effect on Wednesday between Israel and Lebanese-based terror group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, culminating a longtime US-led effort to broker a truce to halt 14 months of cross-border attacks. Hezbollah said the campaign, which it launched unprovoked on October 8, 2023, a day after the Hamas invasion and slaughter in southern Israel, was in support of Palestinians in Gaza.

Following the Lebanon deal, the United States announced a new diplomatic effort with Qatar, Turkey and Egypt to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages taken during Hamas’s brutal October 7, 2023, massacre.

The Hamas onslaught killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and the terror group abducted 251 hostages back to Gaza, where 97 remain in captivity, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF.

The only ceasefire so far, in November 2023, saw the release of 105 civilian hostages kidnapped by Hamas and its allies in exchange for 240 Palestinian security prisoners held by Israel.

Many of the hostages are believed to be in a bad physical state, and a report by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum has estimated that some of them have lost half their body weight.

Maj. Gen. (Res.) Nitzan Alon, an IDF point person on the hostages, has recently said that “the hostages’ condition is deteriorating, some of them are being starved,” Channel 13 reported Sunday. Citing the shortage of many products in the Strip, Alon was said to have added: “Some of the hostages are in a very bad medical condition, and the lives of some of them are in danger.”

The network also reported that security officials have been estimating that some of the captives have died in the past two months.

A senior official from the Palestinian terror group told AFP on Saturday that Hamas is open to discussing “all ideas and proposals” for a potential ceasefire deal.

The terror group has “not received any new offer or proposal so far,” the Hamas official said, but added that the group was “open to discussing all ideas and proposals that lead to the end of the war, Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the return of the displaced, the entry of humanitarian and relief aid, and a serious deal to exchange prisoners.”

Netanyahu said on Thursday that he was “ready for a ceasefire” in the war in Gaza “when we think we can achieve the release of the hostages,” but would not end the war against Hamas — a core demand by the terror group — until it was destroyed militarily and in terms of its capacity to govern.

President Isaac Herzog told the family of Edan Alexander, the American-Israeli hostage who was featured in a video released by Hamas on Saturday, that negotiations for a deal are taking place “behind the scenes.”

“Now, with an agreement reached regarding the northern border with Lebanon, it is time to finalize a deal and bring the hostages home” from Gaza, said the president, according to his office. “We are negotiating with a bitter and cruel enemy whose sole purpose in releasing this video was to try to break our spirit. On the contrary — I believe this video has strengthened us.”

“Now is the opportunity to bring about a meaningful change that will lead to a deal to free the hostages,” he said.

Alexander’s mother Yael said in a speech at a rally on Saturday night that Netanyahu had told her “the conditions are ripe” for a hostage deal.

The New York Times reported last week that Hamas had been showing increased flexibility in long-stalled talks for a deal and may agree to Israel forces temporarily remaining on the enclave’s border with Egypt.

Jerusalem has insisted that troops remain in Gaza to prevent arms smuggling from Egypt and says it is prepared only for a temporary halt in its campaign to destroy Hamas.

Nothing new

Despite the group’s reported flexibility, an Israeli official told The Times of Israel on Sunday that there is “nothing new” in regard to progress on a potential deal.

“I haven’t seen any change, not even in Hamas terminology,” said the official.

The official added that an Israeli pilot plan to use a private US company to hand out humanitarian aid in a small part of the northern Gaza Strip has not yet begun.

The White House echoed the downbeat assessment on Sunday, with the US national security adviser telling NBC that the negotiations are “not there yet.”

“We are working actively to try to make it happen. We are engaged deeply with the key players in the region, and there is activity even today,” said Jake Sullivan, according to a transcript released by the broadcaster.

“There will be further conversations and consultations, and our hope is that we can generate a ceasefire and hostage deal, but we’re not there yet,” he added.

Sullivan told NBC that US President Joe Biden has been closely coordinating with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to try and promote a deal.

“He also spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu that day (of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire), and Prime Minister Netanyahu told him he agreed, the time is right. The moment is now,” said Sullivan.

National Unity chair Benny Gantz on Sunday slammed the government for its refusal to agree to previous proposals.

Gantz estimated that around 30 hostages who have died or been killed in Gaza since they were abducted on October 7 last year would still be alive today had the government not chosen to forgo a hostage deal for “political reasons.”

Speaking at a conference organized by the Israel Hayom daily, Gantz argued that if Israel was able to come to an agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon, it should have also been able to make a deal with Hamas, which he said is “the most dismantled” of Israel’s enemies.

“The return of the hostages is at the core of the values of the State of Israel,” he added. “It is the most important thing.”

On Saturday, far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir issued an ultimatum against a potential hostage-ceasefire deal, warning that the terms under discussion are not acceptable to him and that Netanyahu “very much” does not want him to bolt the government.

“The terms that are currently being discussed are irrelevant as far as I am concerned, and the prime minister very much does not want Otzma Yehudit to leave the government,” Ben Gvir told Army Radio.

Ben Gvir has long been a vocal opponent of a deal to bring the hostages home at the price of stopping the war, and has issued similar ultimatums during previous rounds of negotiations.