Netanyahu’s defiance leaves Israel-Hamas deal out of attain

A day after Israel confirmed that Hamas had killed six hostages in Gaza, the Israeli spy chief flew to Doha to carry talks on the floundering US-led diplomatic push to safe the discharge of the remaining captives and finish the warfare within the strip.

The discussions on Monday between Mossad chief David Barnea and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, one of many principal mediators, centered on the principle hurdle to an settlement: Israel’s insistence that it retain troops on a strip of land alongside Gaza’s border with Egypt often known as the Philadelphi hall. And Barnea supplied a glimmer of hope.

He caught to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s place that Israel wouldn’t withdraw troops from the hall throughout the first part of the three-stage, US-backed deal that has been mentioned for months by mediators. However he added that if an settlement survived an preliminary six-week truce, Israel would “be keen to withdraw troops from there”, stated a diplomat briefed on the talks.

This was thought of a optimistic signal, and “one thing mediators might work with”, the diplomat stated.

The assembly between Barnea, Israel’s principal negotiator, and the Qataris came about as a normal strike in Israel raised public strain on Netanyahu to agree a deal after the killings of the six hostages. The strike adopted mass protests on Sunday evening — the most important demonstrations since Hamas’s October 7 assault triggered the warfare — as lots of of 1000’s of Israelis took to the streets to precise their frustration with the prime minister and his far-right authorities.

But any hopes of a breakthrough had been quickly dashed — as they’ve been repeatedly over the previous months. In a while Monday, Netanyahu held a prolonged press convention wherein he vowed to not “give up” by agreeing to a deal, dismissed the calls for of the protesters and doubled down on the necessity to preserve troops on the Philadelphi hall — seemingly eternally.

Utilizing maps as props, Netanyahu described the strip of land, which Israel says Hamas makes use of to smuggle weapons by the border, as being of “cardinal significance each in bringing [home] the hostages and making certain that Hamas shall be crushed”.

“It is because of this that Hamas is insisting that we not be there, and it is because of this that I insist that we are going to be there,” he added.

His defiance within the face of mounting home and worldwide strain for a deal — and hours after Barnea had held talks in Doha — underscored the intractable challenges mediators face in getting Israel and Hamas to succeed in an settlement.

The diplomat briefed on the talks stated there was no new spherical of negotiations scheduled — at the same time as US officers have warned that the latest talks might be the final probability to get a deal inked.

Neither Hamas, nor Egypt, one of many different principal mediators, is keen to just accept a deal that leaves Israeli troops within the 14km border hall.

After Netanyahu’s press convention, wherein he implied that Egypt had turned a blind eye to Hamas’s arms smuggling, Cairo put out an normally stern condemnation of his feedback, accusing him of “referring to Egypt, to distract Israeli public opinion, impede reaching a ceasefire and an change of hostages and prisoners”.

“Egypt holds accountable the Israeli authorities for the results of those statements which deepen the disaster and goal to justify incitement and hostile insurance policies,” the Egyptian authorities stated.

Qatar put out an announcement expressing “solidarity” with Egypt, saying the “Israeli occupation’s strategy primarily based on an try and falsify details and mislead world public opinion by repeating lies will in the end result in the demise of peace efforts and the growth of violence within the area”.

An individual accustomed to the Egyptian authorities deliberations stated weeks of talks between Cairo and Washington, with enter from Israeli safety officers, had been discussing a “monitoring mechanism” for the Egypt-Gaza frontier to persuade Netanyahu that the border might be secured with out the presence of Israeli forces.

That would embody an underground high-tech barrier to be constructed on the Egyptian facet of the hall, just like the multibillion-dollar fortification Israel constructed a number of years in the past round Gaza in a bid to interdict tunnels. Extra sensors to trace tunnel development would even be deployed, in addition to elite Egyptian troops tasked with halting above-ground smuggling, the individual stated.

The US would seemingly need to fund the scheme, the individual stated, including that Cairo has intimated that “the one assure towards weapons smuggling is Egyptian and Israeli co-operation”.

Nonetheless, the diplomat stated the small print of how the monitoring mechanism would work had been nonetheless not clear. And it might solely succeed if Netanyahu agreed to withdraw Israeli troops.

Netanyahu stated on Wednesday that Israel couldn’t conform to a everlasting ceasefire if the Philadelphi hall was “perforated”. 

“Someone must be there. I don’t care, carry me anybody who will truly present us, not on paper, not in phrases, not in a slide, however on the bottom, day after day, week after week, month after month, that they’ll truly forestall the recurrence of what occurred there earlier than,” he informed reporters. “We’re open to contemplate it. However I don’t see that occuring.”

Even earlier than his Monday evening speech, the US, which has largely put the onus on Hamas to agree a deal, expressed its frustration with the Israeli prime minister’s intransigence. When requested if Netanyahu was doing sufficient to allow a deal, President Joe Biden gave a blunt “no”.

Mediators have been utilizing the define of a three-phase deal Biden endorsed on Could 31, which requires the discharge of hostages in change for Palestinian prisoners, the redeployment of Israeli troops from Gaza’s populated areas within the first part, and their full withdrawal from the strip within the second stage.

The US offered what it referred to as a “bridging proposal” to Israel final month, the small print of which haven’t been made public. Hamas insists an earlier model of the plan endorsed by Biden be applied, whereas Netanyahu’s insistence on protecting troops within the Philadelphi hall has deadlocked the method.

“Mediators are working laborious on looking for an answer, however they’re in a troublesome place, as a result of in case you permit Israel to remain within the Philadelphi hall, Egypt and Hamas gained’t conform to it,” the diplomat stated. “In case you push Israel to go away, Netanyahu won’t ever conform to it.”

Israeli opposition leaders and, in personal, safety officers accuse Netanyahu of wilfully undermining any doable deal, particularly at key moments the place progress was evident, in a bid to make sure his political survival.

Far-right ministers who’re key to Netanyahu’s ruling coalition have threatened to topple the federal government if he agrees to what they describe as a “reckless” deal.

On Tuesday, opposition politician Benny Gantz, who was a part of the warfare cupboard earlier than he resigned in June, stated the federal government wanted to prioritise the hostages’ launch even at the price of withdrawing from Philadelphi.

“The hostages have to be returned, even at a heavy worth,” stated Gantz, a former army chief. “Netanyahu is coping with political survival, and harming the strategic relations with the US.”