Efforts to reach a ceasefire and release hostages in the Gaza Strip have gained momentum after Hamas presented a revised proposal for the terms of an agreement and Israel announced it would resume stalled negotiations.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday that he would send a delegation to resume negotiations, and an Israeli official said his country’s team would be led by the head of the Mossad intelligence agency.
Biden welcomed the move, and a source in Israel’s negotiating team, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was now a real chance of reaching an agreement.
The Israeli comments stood in sharp contrast to previous incidents in the nine-month Gaza war, when Israel said the conditions imposed by Hamas were unacceptable.
A Palestinian official close to the internationally brokered peace efforts said the militant Islamist group’s latest proposal could lead to a framework agreement if Israel accepts it.
He said Hamas would no longer demand a permanent ceasefire from Israel as a precondition for signing an agreement and would allow negotiations during an initial six-week phase to achieve it.
“If the sides need more time to reach agreement on a permanent ceasefire, they should agree that fighting will not resume until that happens,” the official told Reuters.
Hamas later declared that it rejected the presence of foreign troops in the Gaza Strip, signaling its opposition to any plan to send an international contingent to the Gaza Strip to help maintain peace in the Palestinian enclave.
The Popular Resistance Committees (PRC), allied with Hamas, however, declared that they would view all international or other forces in the Gaza Strip as occupiers.
According to Gaza health authorities, more than 38,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive, which was launched in response to a Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7 last year. According to Israeli sources, 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 were taken hostage in the attack.
The war has caused hundreds of thousands of Gaza residents to flee and triggered a humanitarian crisis.
In addition, the incident has fuelled tensions across the region and led to exchanges of fire on Israel’s northern border with the Lebanese Hezbollah group.
Hamas said it had informed Hezbollah that it had agreed to a ceasefire proposal in the Gaza Strip and that the Lebanese group’s leader welcomed the move, two sources familiar with the matter said.
“If there is a Gaza agreement, there will be a ceasefire in Lebanon from zero hour,” said one of the sources, a representative of Hezbollah, which says its rocket and drone attacks on northern Israel are in support of the Palestinians.
Hamas’s new proposal was a response to a plan released by Biden in late May that calls for the release of about 120 hostages still held in Gaza and a ceasefire.
The plan envisages the gradual release of hostages and the withdrawal of Israeli forces in two initial phases, as well as the release of Palestinian prisoners.
A third phase concerns the reconstruction of Gaza.
Israel had previously stated that it would only accept temporary pauses in fighting until Hamas, which has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2007, was wiped out.
An Israeli delegation in Egypt discussed details of the possible agreement on Thursday, Egyptian security sources said.
They said Israel would respond to Hamas’ proposal for talks with Qatar, which, like Egypt, has mediated in the peace efforts.