A screen grab taken from an AFPTV footage shows Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir speaking at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem on 17 July 2024. (AFPTV/AFP)
- Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir
demands an end to ceasefire talks with Hamas. - He is urging instead for a more aggressive stance,
including stopping fuel and electricity transfers. - The US State Department emphasised the importance of
finalising a ceasefire deal that would see the release of hostages in exchange
for Palestinian prisoners, despite Netanyahu’s refusal to offer concessions.
An Israeli far-right minister stepped up pressure on Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to end negotiations for a Gaza
ceasefire aimed at securing the release of hostages.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir called for an end
to indirect talks with Hamas, which Israel has accused of executing six
hostages whose bodies were found in a Gaza tunnel last week.
“A country whose six hostages are murdered in cold
blood does not negotiate with the killers, but ends the talks, stops the
transfer of fuel and electricity, and crushes them until they collapse,”
Ben Gvir wrote on the social media platform X.
Ben Gvir, along with far-right Finance Minister Bezalel
Smotrich, are key members of Netanyahu’s coalition government and have
steadfastly opposed ceasefire talks, insisting that continuing the war in Gaza
is the only way to destroy Hamas.
Indirect talks between Israel and Hamas have been held for
months through mediators the United States, Egypt and Qatar, but so far there
has been no breakthrough.
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The United States said on Tuesday it was time to
“finalise” a deal to end the war that would help free the hostages in
exchange for an unspecified number of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli
jails.
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington
would work “over the coming days” with other mediators “to push
for a final agreement.”
Miller said:
It is time to finalise that deal.
But Netanyahu has refused to offer any
“concessions” in these negotiations, despite mounting domestic and
international pressure following the recovery of the six dead hostages.
One key sticking point has been Netanyahu’s insistence that
Israeli troops remain at the border between Gaza and Egypt, known as the
Philadelphi Corridor.
But Miller said on Tuesday that Israel had agreed to
withdraw forces from the border area.
“The bridging proposal that we put forward, that the
government of Israel agreed to, it did include the removal of the IDF (Israeli
military) from densely populated areas. That includes the Philadelphi
Corridor,” Miller said, referring to Israeli forces.
He said:
We are opposed to the long-term presence of IDF troops in Gaza.
Hamas has insisted that it wants a complete withdrawal of
Israeli forces from Gaza for any deal to take place.
During the 7 October attack on Israel, Palestinian militants
seized 251 hostages, 97 of whom are still held in Gaza, including 33 the
Israeli military says are dead.
The attack itself resulted in the deaths of 1 205 people,
mostly civilians including some hostages killed in captivity, according to
official Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military offensive in Gaza has so far
killed at least 40,819 people, according to the health ministry in the
Hamas-run territory.
Most of the dead are women and children, according to the UN
rights office.
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