Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has angered practically everyone involved in the process of negotiating a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, including Israeli security officials. Hamas has warned that the new IDF assault on Gaza City, which began early yesterday, along with Netanyahu’s “non-negotiables,'’ are ruining the prospects for resumed negotiations for the U.S.-sponsored ceasefire deal. Hamas said in a statement issued yesterday that Ismail Haniyeh, the political chief of Hamas, “made urgent contacts with the mediator brothers, warning of the disastrous repercussions of what is happening in Gaza City, Rafah and other areas across the Gaza Strip; noting that this would return the negotiating process to point zero, and Netanyahu and his army bear full responsibility for the collapse of this negotiation path.”
Only about two hours earlier, Hamas had warned that while it was demonstrating “flexibility and positivity to facilitate reaching an agreement to halt the Zionist aggression, Netanyahu is placing additional obstacles in the way of negotiations, as he escalates his aggression and crimes against our people, and intensifies his attempts of forced displacement to fail all efforts to reach an agreement.”
