Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday seemed to back away from ceasefire negotiations with Hamas, stating that it was evident the Palestinian terrorists were not interested in reaching an agreement.
Netanyahu said Israel was now considering “alternative” options to achieve its goals of bringing its hostages home from Gaza and ending the rule of Hamas in the territory. Trump said he believed Hamas leaders would now be “hunted down”.
The remarks appeared to leave little to no room, at least in the short term, to resume negotiations to pause the fighting, at a time when international concern is mounting over worsening hunger in war-shattered Gaza.
French President Emmanuel Macron, responding to the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza, announced overnight that Paris would become the first major Western power to recognise an independent Palestinian state. Britain and Germany said they were not yet ready to do so.
Israel and the United States withdrew their delegations on Thursday from the ceasefire talks in Qatar, hours after Hamas submitted its response to a truce proposal.
Hamas To Be Blamed
Sources initially said on Thursday that the Israeli withdrawal was only for consultations and did not necessarily mean the talks had reached a crisis. But Netanyahu’s remarks suggested Israel’s position had hardened overnight.
U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff said overnight that Hamas was to blame for the impasse, and Netanyahu said Witkoff had got it right.
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim said on Facebook that the talks had been constructive, and criticised Witkoff’s remarks as aimed at exerting pressure on Israel’s behalf.
“What we have presented – with full awareness and understanding of the complexity of the situation – we believe could lead to a deal if the enemy had the will to reach one,” he said.
The proposed ceasefire would suspend fighting for 60 days, allow more aid into Gaza, and free some of the 50 remaining hostages held by terrorists in return for Palestinian prisoners jailed in Israel.
It has been held up by disagreement over how far Israel should withdraw its troops and the future beyond the 60 days if no permanent agreement is reached.
Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on X: “The humiliating negotiation ceremony with terrorists is over. Mr Prime Minister, now is the time for victory!”
Mass Hunger
International aid organisations say mass hunger has now arrived among Gaza’s 2.2 million people, with stocks running out after Israel cut off all supplies to the territory in March, then reopened it in May but with new restrictions.
The Israeli military said on Friday it had agreed to let countries airdrop aid into Gaza. Hamas dismissed this as a stunt.
“The Gaza Strip does not need flying aerobatics, it needs an open humanitarian corridor and a steady daily flow of aid trucks to save what remains of the lives of besieged, starving civilians,” Ismail Al-Thawabta, director of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, said.
Gaza medical authorities said nine more Palestinians had died over the past 24 hours from malnutrition or starvation. Dozens have died in the past few weeks as hunger worsens.
Israel says it has let enough food into Gaza and accuses the United Nations of failing to distribute it, in what the Israeli foreign ministry called on Friday “a deliberate ploy to defame Israel”. The United Nations says it is operating as effectively as possible under Israeli restrictions.
United Nations agencies said on Friday that supplies were running out in Gaza of specialised therapeutic food to save the lives of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition.
Israeli Offensives
The ceasefire talks have been accompanied by continuing Israeli offensives on the ground. Palestinian health officials said Israeli airstrikes and gunfire had killed at least 21 people across the enclave on Friday, including five killed in a strike on a school sheltering displaced families in Gaza City.
In Gaza City, residents carried the body of journalist Adam Abu Harbid through the streets wrapped in a white shroud, his blue flak jacket marked PRESS draped across his body. He was killed overnight in a strike on tents housing displaced people.
Mahmoud Awadia, another journalist attending the funeral, said the Israelis were deliberately trying to kill reporters.
“We will stay, we will continue this message of exposing the crimes of the Israeli occupation and its systematic targeting of our journalist colleagues,” he said. Israel denies intentionally targeting journalists.
Israel launched its assault on Gaza after Hamas-led fighters stormed Israeli towns near the border, killing some 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages on October 7, 2023. Since then, Israeli forces have killed nearly 60,000 people in Gaza, health officials there say, and reduced much of the enclave to ruins.
France Calls For Palestinian Independence
Israel and the United States criticised Macron’s decision to recognise Palestinian independence. Netanyahu called it a “reward for terrorism”.
Western countries have been committed for decades to an eventual independent Palestinian state but have long said it should arise out of a negotiated peace process.
Europe’s two other big powers, Britain and Germany, made clear there were no plans to act on Palestinian statehood right away. Germany has a long history of supporting Israel arising from its guilt in the Nazi Holocaust, while Britain has tried to avoid contradicting U.S. policy in the belief it best exerts influence as Washington’s close ally.
“Israel’s security is of paramount importance to the German government,” a German government spokesperson said. “The German government therefore has no plans to recognise a Palestinian state in the short term.”
Peter Kyle, a minister in Starmer’s cabinet, told Sky News: “We want Palestinian statehood, we desire it… But right now, today, we’ve got to focus on what will ease the suffering, and it is extreme, unwarranted suffering in Gaza that has to be the priority for us today.”
(With inputs from Reuters)
