A delegation from the Palestinian group Hamas has landed in Cairo on Saturday evening to “listen to the results of negotiations thus far” between mediators – Egypt, Qatar and the United States – and Israel.
Observers are reluctant to call this a hopeful sign as conviction grows that Gaza ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel are on the verge of collapse.
Negotiations of some form or another have been ongoing practically since October 7, the day Israel launched a war on Gaza that has killed more than 40,000 people and destroyed most of the Strip – ostensibly in retribution for a Hamas-led attack on Israel that killed 1,139 people and took more than 200 captive.
An agreement had seemed close in May when the US said it had a draft proposal approved by all parties and endorsed by the UN Security Council on June 10.
Eleventh-hour failures
Hamas agreed to the proposal, emphasising that it wanted the Israeli army out of Gaza, the return of people to their north Gaza homes that they had been driven out of, international engagement to rebuild Gaza, and the release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
Israeli officials kept making statements indicating that the war on Gaza must continue – and the Israeli army invaded Rafah.
Yet the US maintained that Israel had accepted the proposal and the stumbling block was Hamas, which was holding up all progress.
With a ceasefire agreement seemingly in arm’s reach, it disappeared.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu maintained his rhetoric of continuing to fight until “Hamas is completely defeated in Gaza”, a goal long called out as unrealistic by parties on both sides.
He eventually also presented new demands: that Israel remain in the Philadelphi Corridor abutting Egypt’s Sinai, checkpoints be set up to “vet” people trying to go back to their homes in north Gaza, and that full lists be provided of all living captives Hamas intends to release.
Senior Israeli officials said Netanyahu’s demands would sabotage the talks, and the mediators refused to pass them on to Hamas.
Egypt has refused Israel’s demand that it be allowed to remain in the Philadelpi Corridor, which would violate the Camp David Accords between the two.
Blinken’s rhetoric
The US proposal followed past drafts, sticking to a three-phase process that would release all captives in Gaza in exchange for prisoners held by Israel, achieving a “sustainable calm” to lead to a full ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, the reconstruction of the Strip, and the eventual opening of crossings.
“We had a proposal that [US President Biden] laid out in late May which was fairly detailed and passed at the UN Security Council as a resolution [with] global support,” Matt Duss, the executive vice president at the Center for International Policy in Washington, DC, said.
“Yet, we’ve seen various rounds of new conditions added by Netanyahu who, despite Biden saying Israel supports it, made it very clear that he didn’t.”
Netanyahu was criticised by Israeli negotiators for undermining talks after a local broadcaster reported comments he made about Israel not leaving the Philadelphi or Netzarim Corridor – which the Israeli army created to separate north and south Gaza – “under any circumstances”.
US officials have been in the region trying to work out sticking points in recent days with a “bridging proposal” that reportedly includes withdrawal plans.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, however, would not say if the proposal includes the Israeli army fully withdrawing from Gaza as earlier proposals mentioned. But he maintained his earlier assessment as to who was holding things up.
“In a very constructive meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu today, he confirmed to me that Israel supports the bridging proposal,” Blinken said to reporters after a two-and-a-half-hour meeting with Netanyahu on Monday. “The next important step is for Hamas to say ‘yes’.”
Blinken’s claims were rejected by Hamas, who maintained that they wanted to stick to the agreed-upon deal.
“The Israelis have retreated from issues included in Biden’s proposal. Netanyahu’s talk about agreeing to an updated proposal indicates that the US administration has failed to convince him to accept the previous agreement,” Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan told Al Jazeera on Monday.
And while Blinken has held firm in public that Netanyahu agrees to the deal, Israeli media have reported things playing out differently behind the scenes.
US backing Netanyahu ‘for inexplicable reasons’
The Biden administration’s continued support for Netanyahu, despite his reported obstinance, has left many analysts baffled.
“We’re in this surreal situation where both Hamas and Israeli security officials are saying Netanyahu is the one blocking Biden’s ceasefire proposal,” Mohamad Bazzi, director of Near Eastern Studies at New York University, told Al Jazeera.
“We also see that Netanyahu publicly rejected key elements of the ceasefire as Blinken has described the deal … but at same time both [US President Joseph] Biden and Blinken insist that Netanyahu supports the current deal and Hamas is the stumbling block.
“So we end up with the US administration covering for Netanyahu for inexplicable reasons.”
While Israel’s stated objective for the talks is retrieving captives held in Gaza, Netanyahu’s reported sabotage of talks has some questioning if he is genuinely interested in a deal.
Some 109 captives remain in Gaza, according to Israeli government estimates, and US officials believe half of them to still be alive.
Families who have loved ones missing in Gaza have been protesting regularly and calling on their government to save the captives.
“There’s a very strong argument that Netanyahu doesn’t want a ceasefire at this point,” Bazzi said. “In many ways, why should he when the US won’t impose any cost on him for being the biggest obstacle to a ceasefire?”
‘Doomed’
Biden and his administration have criticised Netanyahu in the past.
In April, Biden said Netanyahu was making a mistake in his handling of the war in Gaza.
Then in early June, Biden suggested Netanyahu was prolonging the war for personal and political gain.
Despite the criticisms, the Biden administration has refused to condition their support of Netanyahu’s government.
“Biden has two very important levers, the primary being the holding or conditioning of military aid and the second is the political cover at the UN Security Council and other international bodies… and he doesn’t seem to use them.,” Bazzi said.
The failure to hold Netanyahu and Israel to account has led to questions over the US’s accountability over the destruction of Gaza.
“Biden is completely complicit in this war that wouldn’t have been possible in the first place, … without full US support and cover,” Gilbert Achcar, professor of development studies and international relations at SOAS University of London, said.
“These negotiations were doomed to fail from the start… it’s basically a waste of time,” Achcar said.
“The function is more for the Biden administration to try to show that it is doing something. But I think they know quite well that it’s leading nowhere because the gap between what Netanyahu wants and what Hamas requests is too wide to be overcome.”