'Not what we agreed to': Why Israel rejected Hamas' Gaza ceasefire proposal

US State Department still believes Israel-Hamas truce agreement is 'absolutely achievable'

After Hamas on Monday said it had accepted what it described as an Egyptian and Qatari ceasefire and hostage release proposal, Israeli officials reportedly said that the terms of the proposed agreement did not meet Israel's requirements. 

After the office of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh announced the group's acceptance of the proposal, a senior Hamas official told an international news agency that the ball was now in Israel's court. "After Hamas agreed to the mediators' proposal for a ceasefire, the ball is now in the court of Israeli occupation, whether it will agree to the ceasefire agreement or obstruct it,” said the Hamas official.   

 

However, Israeli officials who had received the Hamas response said that the terms that Hamas said it had accepted did not match those that Israel had approved, the Times of Israel reported late on Monday. 

What proposal has Hamas accepted? 

The proposal that Hamas has agreed to comprises a three-phased agreement, with each stage being 42-days long, Khalil al-Hayya, a deputy of Hamas' Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, told Al Jazeera. 

According to the Hamas leader, under the proposal agreed to by his group, there is a "clear commitment to temporarily stop military operations" on the first day of the agreement's first phase. 

An announcement of "permanent cessation of military and hostile operations" is provided for in the second phase. 

The Hamas leader also said that Egypt would be a guarantor of the deal and ensure that the war does not start again. He also claimed that the mediators had told Hamas that US President Joe Biden was committed to ensuring that the agreement would be implemented. 

Meanwhile, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that Hamas sources were claiming to have received assurances from the US, Qatar and Egypt that Israel would not resume the war after the implementation of the three-stage deal.     

Why is Israel opposed to Hamas' latest offer? 

The Israeli negotiating team is of the view that the proposal Hamas said it accepted was "not the same proposal" for a deal that Israel and Egypt had agreed to 10 days ago, and which had become the basis for negotiations since then, Israel officials told Israel's Channel 12 news. 

According to the officials, "all kinds of clauses" had been inserted into the proposal. 

Israel's rejection of the Hamas terms stems from the fact that these new clauses reportedly deal with whether the ongoing Israel-Hamas war will end, and if so, how and when. The new clauses also deal with the guarantees that will be provided to ensure that the war ends.   

Hamas has been reportedly toughening its stance and demanding that the war end during the first phase itself of any prospective deal, instead of in the second or third phases. 

However, Israel has repeatedly rejected any condition that would have it end the war as part of a hostage deal. Instead, Israel insists that it will resume fighting once any such deal is implemented. It would do so to achieve its twin war goals: Getting the hostages back home and destroying Hamas' military and governance capabilities. 

For months now, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that regardless of a hostage release deal, Israeli forces would eliminate the final Hamas strongholds in the southern Gaza city of Rafah. On Monday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) began issuing evacuation orders to Palestinian civilians in the area.

Meanwhile, Hamas, too, has rejected repeated Israeli truce offers. While media reports have often suggested that a breakthrough was around the corner throughout months of negotiations, talks to secure a deal have always broken down, mostly due to one major disagreement. While Hamas has been demanding a permanent ceasefire, Israel has refused to end the war without eliminating Hamas' remaining fighters, especially in Rafah.   

The ongoing war erupted after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, leading to 1,200 deaths and 252 people being taken hostage. In response, Israel launched an offensive aimed at eliminating Hamas' military and governance capabilities in Gaza and freeing the hostages, 128 of whom continue to be in captivity. Since then, over 34,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to figures from Hamas health officials. Meanwhile, about 270 IDF soldiers have been killed in the fighting in Gaza.     

What's happening behind the scenes? 

Hamas' announcement that it had accepted a proposal appeared to be "a ruse" that was meant to make Israel look like the side that was refusing a deal, an unnamed Israeli official told Reuters.   

However, another unnamed official, who had been briefed on the negotiations, reportedly said that the proposal Hamas had accepted was effectively the same as one that had been agreed upon by Israel at the end of April.

Meanwhile, a US official told Reuters that Israeli PM Netanyahu and Israel's War Cabinet "have not appeared to approach the latest phase of negotiations in good faith". 

What will Israel do next? 

On Monday, a statement from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said that Hamas' offer was "far from Israel's essential requirements". But, the statement added that Israel would send teams to hold talks with the mediators "to exhaust the possibility of achieving an agreement on terms that are acceptable to Israel".   

In the meantime, the statement said that Israel's War Cabinet had taken a unanimous decision to push ahead with an IDF operation in Rafah to apply "military pressure on Hamas". Meanwhile, the IDF said on Monday that its troops were striking Hamas sites in eastern Rafah "in a targeted manner".   

How has the US reacted?   

Washington was reviewing Hamas' response to the latest truce proposal and discussing it with the Egyptian and Qatari mediators, said US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller. Stating that CIA Director Bill Burns was in the region to work on a truce agreement, Miller added that a deal was "absolutely achievable".   

Stating that reaching an agreement would be the "absolute best outcome", White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said: "We want to get these hostages out, we want to get a ceasefire in place for six weeks, we want to increase humanitarian assistance."     

(With agency inputs)