As Israel pushes deeper into areas of southern Gaza believed to be where the remaining Hamas leadership, inclding Yahya Sinwar, are believed hiding deep underground with most of the remaining hostages, Egypt put forth a ceasefire proposal to be implemented in three stages:
Egypt proposed a new outline for a hostage release deal on Sunday that would see Hamas release 40 Israelis taken into the Gaza Strip in exchange for a 14-day truce, Israeli and foreign media reported.As per Cairo’s proposal, the IDF would halt all military and intelligence operations in the Strip for two weeks in exchange for the release of 40 hostages.The Egyptian deal, reported by foreign media citing Palestinian officials to be a “three-stage” plan to end fighting Gaza, also includes the release of 120 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.The second stage of the Egyptian proposal includes negotiations with the Palestinian Authority in hopes of establishing an emergency security government in Gaza involving different Palestinian factions.The third stage, as per the reports, includes a prolonged period of ceasefire, the return of more hostages from Gaza, and an eventual withdrawal of Israeli forces from the coastal enclave.
It’s hard to imagine that three-stage proposal would have been acceptable to Israel, as it would allow Hamas to survive, but it also would have meant Hamas relinquishing control. Hamas and Palesinian Islamic Jihad immediately rejected the proposal, demanding a ceasefire before any negotiations. As Reuters reports:
Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad have rejected an Egyptian proposal that they relinquish power in the Gaza Strip in return for a permanent ceasefire, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters on Monday.
Two officials from Hamas and the Islamic Jihad groups later separately denied what the sources said about the talks.
Izzat al-Rishq, a member of Hamas’ political bureau, added: “There can be no negotiations without a complete stop to the aggression.” ….
Egypt proposed a “vision” rather than a concrete plan, also backed by Qatari mediators, that would involve a ceasefire in exchange for the release of more hostages, and lead to a broader agreement involving a permanent ceasefire along with an overhaul of leadership in Gaza, which is currently led by Hamas.
Egypt proposed elections while offering assurances to Hamas that its members would not be chased or prosecuted, but the Islamist group rejected any concessions other than hostage releases, the sources said. More than 100 hostages are still believed to be held in Gaza.
In another development, in a statement published by Qatari-controlled Al Jazeera, Sinwar stated:
“The Al-Qassam Brigades are fighting a fierce, violent, and unprecedented battle against the ‘Israeli’ occupation forces, and the occupation army is suffering heavy losses in lives and equipment.During the ground invasion, the Al-Qassam Brigades targeted at least 5,000 soldiers and officers, a third of whom were killed, another third seriously injured, and the last third permanently disabled. As for military vehicles, 750 were destroyed, either completely or partially.The Al-Qassam Brigades have crushed the ‘Israeli’ occupation army and will continue to do so. We will not submit to the occupation’s conditions.”
Inexplicably, the statement was later removed by Al Jazeera, but the rejection of the Egyptian proposal remained.
To put it mildly, the grandiose claims in Sinwar’s statement are delusional:
Sinwar falsely claimed that the al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, had “targeted” over 5,000 Israeli soldiers and officers, and killed about third of them — that is, over 1,500.The actual figure of IDF deaths is one-tenth of what the terror leader alleged. According to the IDF, 156 soldiers have so far been killed in the ground operation in Gaza. Over 300 members of the security forces were killed in Hamas’s initial October 7 onslaught.The terror leader also gave inflated claims of the number of Israeli soldiers injured in the war, and the amount of Israeli military equipment that has been destroyed. He claimed that around 3,500 troops were seriously wounded or disabled, whereas that figure according to the IDF stands at less than 200.He further said that Hamas had completely or partially destroyed 750 Israeli military vehicles. While the IDF has not provided official figures, the commander of the IDF Technology and Maintenance Corps, Brig. Gen. Ariel Shima, said in early November that very few IDF vehicles had been severely damaged beyond repair, and that most vehicles that are hit return to fighting.
In an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, Israeli Prime Minister reiterated the requirements for peace:
Hamas must be destroyed, Gaza must be demilitarized, and Palestinian society must be deradicalized. These are the three prerequisites for peace between Israel and its Palestinian neighbors in Gaza.Once Hamas is destroyed, Gaza is demilitarized and Palestinian society begins a deradicalization process, Gaza can be rebuilt and the prospects of a broader peace in the Middle East will become a reality.
Netanyahu also told the families of remaining hostages that the military campaign would continue and intensify (emphasis added):
I want to tell you, members of Knesset and dear families, we would not have succeeded in freeing more than 100 hostages thus far without military pressure. All the pressures that we are applying, diplomatic, intelligence and others, would not succeed without military pressure. We will not be able to release all the hostages without military pressure, operational pressure, diplomatic pressure. And therefore there is one thing we will not do—we will not stop fighting.I came here directly from Gaza. Just an hour ago, I was in the Salatin neighborhood, which abuts Jabaliya and Beit Lahiya. There, in the dust and the mud and among the ruins, I met the heroic and determined fighters of the Bahad 1 reserves brigade. You should hear them. I spoke with Brigade Commander Yehuda, who commands the reserves brigade. I asked him what they most needed. He told me that there are battles all the time and that they killed terrorists, and that unfortunately they lost several of their brothers-in-arms, but that they keep fighting. They kill terrorists all the time, day in and day out, even on an hourly basis. I asked him, ‘What do you need the most?’ And he answered, ‘Time. We need time.’We need to keep going until the end. I spoke with Uri, a battalion commander in the reserves. He is a father of eight children. Five of his family members are fighting in Gaza. He told me, ‘We need to keep going until the end.’ He hasn’t been home in two months. He told me, ‘My wife is at home and tells me to take two more months. Take however long it takes. To the end.’I heard similar statements from the family members of our brave fallen soldiers. You should hear them. They speak with broken hearts and with tears in their eyes, but I must tell you, with their heads held high. They weep and I embrace them, and they stand with their heads held high. From the depths of their grief, they cry out, ‘Our children did not die in vain. We cannot stop the war until we ensure total victory over those who seek to kill us.’To you, IDF soldiers, and to you, hurting families and relatives of the hostages, and from this podium, I say: We are not stopping and we will not stop until we are victorious, because we have no country but this one, and we have no other way. Together with you, together with every home in Israel and every citizen of Israel, I pray for the well-being of our hostages, our brothers and sisters: ‘Our brothers, the entire family of Israel, who are delivered into distress and captivity, whether they are on sea or dry land – may God have mercy on them and remove them from stress to relief, from darkness to light, from subjugation to redemption now, speedily and soon.’
The reference to “I have no other country” must have been deliberate.
Israeli song – ‘I have no other country’
“I have no other country even as my land is aflame. Just a word in Hebrew pierces my veins, my soul, with a weak body, with a broken heart. This is my home.I will not stay silent if my country changed her faceI will not give up reminding her And sing in her ears she will open her eyes.I have no other country even as my land is aflame. Just a word in Hebrew pierces my veins, my soul, with a weak body, with a broken heart. This is my home.”
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