The White House has said “it expects Israel to say yes” to a Gaza peace plan despite so far rejecting it.
Joe Biden, the US president, has issued a three-part plan to end the war after mounting frustration with how long and violent it has become.
His proposal would start with a six-week ceasefire that would see Israeli forces withdraw from populated areas of Gaza and include the exchange of hostages held by Hamas for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
Appearing on ABC News’ This Week on Sunday, John Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, said the deal is an “Israeli proposal, and one that they arrived at after intense diplomacy with our own national security team, and over at the State Department”.
He added: “Where we are right now is that proposal, an Israeli proposal, has been given to Hamas. It was done on Thursday night our time. We’re waiting for an official response from Hamas.
“We would note that publicly, Hamas officials came out and welcomed this proposal.”
Mr Kirby’s comments appeared at odds with the Israeli prime minister’s position as of Saturday. In a statement, Benjamin Netanyahu said a permanent ceasefire is a “total non-starter”, adding: “Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed: the destruction of Hamas’s military and governing capabilities, the freeing of all hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.”
His Right-wing coalition has also threatened to dissolve the government if Mr Netanyahu does not continue with its aim of eliminating Hamas. Bezalel Smotrich, the minister of economy, said that “we will not agree to the end of the war before the destruction of Hamas, nor to a serious damage to the achievements of the war so far through the withdrawal of the IDF and the return of Gazans to the north of the Gaza Strip, nor to the wholesale release of terrorists who will return, God forbid, to murder Jews.”
Israel argues that the tunnels linking the Philadelphi corridor, between Gaza and Egypt, where the Israeli army is currently in full operational control, can still be used by Hamas to gain access to a ready supply of weapons and funding from its allies abroad.
However, in the interview on Sunday, Mr Kirby said that US intelligence suggests Hamas has been militarily degraded to the extent that it can no longer repeat an attack such as that which its fighters conducted on Oct 7.
Official response
Mr Kirby said: “We’ve not said that they don’t still represent a viable threat to the Israeli people. Of course they do. But they don’t have the military capabilities to do what they did.”
“We’re waiting for an official response from Hamas,” he said, adding that the US hopes that both sides agree to start the first phase of the plan “as soon as possible”.
Mr Kirby’s comments appear to signal that the US won’t countenance the war running as long as Israel’s National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi suggested this week that it might – for at least seven months more.
The death toll in Gaza has exceeded 36,000, according to Hamas, and international pressure is becoming impossible to ignore, with orders from the International Court of Justice ordering the operation in Rafah stop immediately.
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