Egypt: Hamas Isn’t Going to Agree to a Ceasefire

This is a potentially important update for all of the people who are out there screaming in the streets and demanding a “ceasefire now!” According to Egypt, which has been involved in the ongoing negotiations, Hamas has already been offered a ceasefire. Several of them, actually. They have consistently turned them down and will do so again this week. Most recently, Hamas was offered a six-week ceasefire that would take them fully through the holy month of Ramadan, along with a very generous ratio in a prisoner-for-hostages exchange and large increases in aid deliveries during the pause in the fighting. Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan has already released a statement saying that they will not accept the terms. (Associated Press)

Three days of negotiations with Hamas over a cease-fire in Gaza and the release of Israeli hostages failed to achieve a breakthrough Tuesday, Egyptian officials said, less than a week before the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the informal deadline for a deal.

The nearly five months of fighting left much of Gaza in ruins and created a worsening humanitarian catastrophe, with many, especially in the devastated northern region, scrambling for food to survive.

“We must get more aid into Gaza,” U.S. President Joe Biden said Tuesday. “There’s no excuse. None.”

Aid groups have said it has become nearly impossible to deliver supplies within most of Gaza because of the difficulty of coordinating with the Israeli military, the ongoing hostilities and the breakdown of public order.

What should have been obvious from the beginning (and was to many of us) is that Hamas is not engaged in any serious negotiations and they have no intention of striking a reasonable deal. Hamdan made his priorities clear in his most recent statement. He’s not looking for a compromise. He wants Israel to surrender. He is demanding a permanent ceasefire and the full withdrawal of all IDF forces and Israeli personnel from Gaza. And even then he isn’t saying that he will release all of the hostages or even a list of names of the surviving captives. 

I have some bad news for Osama Hamdan. This is a war and it’s a war that Hamas started. You don’t surrender in a war when you are winning. Bibi Netanyahu has been clear about that from the first day of the counteroffensive. Hamas can either surrender en masse or be destroyed. And if that means that Gaza has to be smashed until there are no two stones left standing one atop the other, so be it. If Israel were to evacuate at this point, Hamas would simply start recruiting and rebuilding and they would go back to launching terror attacks against Israel with the full backing of Iran.

It’s fairly obvious that Hamas wouldn’t even be bothering with these sham negotiations if they didn’t offer the chance to buy some time. The terror group is counting on international pressure on Israel and the United States to eventually force Bibi to relent and pull back. Sadly, much of the international press and pro-Hamas activists in America and at the UN are playing into that strategy right on cue. But at least for the time being, Netanyahu is standing strong and refusing to back down.

It’s equally true that Osama Hamdan has given Israel absolutely no reason to believe that he’s negotiating in good faith. Why would he not agree to release a list of the names of the surviving hostages? Why wouldn’t he release the bodies of the dead? They’re no good to him as any sort of trading currency at this point. I suspect we all know the answers to those questions. There may not even be any living hostages at this point. And if there are, they have probably been so badly abused by now that when they told their stories the entire world would be enraged and realize what a group of monsters we’re actually dealing with. Hamas must be crushed once and for all. And we should not stand in Israel’s way while they do what needs to be done. Earlier today, a Hamas spokesman said that the talks would “resume next week.” Obviously, we shouldn’t be getting our hopes up.