Doha, Qatar – Palestinian Islamist group Hamas on Monday again accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of delaying a Gaza ceasefire and hostage exchange deal.
It said he had set new conditions that mark a “retreat” from an earlier draft.
The statement came after Egyptian, Qatari and US mediators met with Israeli negotiators in Rome on Sunday as international pressure for a ceasefire grows after more than nine months of war.
“We in the Hamas movement have listened to the mediators regarding what transpired recently in the Rome meeting, concerning the ceasefire negotiations and prisoner exchange,” the group said in a statement.
“It is clear from what the mediators conveyed that Netanyahu has returned to his strategy of procrastination, stalling, and evading reaching an agreement by setting new conditions and demands,” it added.
The new terms, Hamas said, represent “a retreat” from an earlier draft communicated by mediators.
US President Joe Biden outlined in late May what he called an Israeli initiative for a truce and hostage release deal, and this has become the basis for subsequent talks.
A source with knowledge of the talks said last week that Israel’s return with extra demands was “a recurring theme” in the process and Israel had “moved the goalposts” with three new requests.
On Monday evening Netanyahu’s office said “Hamas leadership is preventing an agreement” and denied Israel had made changes to the draft outline.
Netanyahu’s office said it stood by the principles of the original outline, which it said featured “maximising the number of living hostages, Israeli control over the Philadelphi Corridor and preventing the passage of terrorists, weapons and ammunition to the northern Gaza Strip.”
The source who spoke last week on condition of anonymity, due to the sensitivity of the talks, said Israel had requested its forces remain in the Philadelphi corridor, a 14-kilometre (8.5-mile) stretch along the Gaza-Egypt border, and that it controls the return of displaced Gazan civilians to the north of the Palestinian territory.
Israel also asked that its troop positions in Gaza be resolved before the truce begins, the source added.
‘Sabotage’
Hamas officials have previously accused Netanyahu of hindering negotiations, and Israelis have made similar allegations. Israeli demonstrators, who have taken to the streets sometimes in the tens of thousands to demand a hostage-release deal, have also accused the prime minister of prolonging the war.
Far-right members of Netanyahu’s ruling coalition oppose any truce.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum campaign group, which seeks the return of hostages still held by fighters in Gaza, alleged “deliberate sabotage” of the efforts, after the arrival of Israeli negotiators in Qatar was postponed from Thursday into this week.
Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been involved in months of mediation efforts aimed at ending the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
The proposed truce deal would be linked to the release of the hostages held by Gaza fighters in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 39,363 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, which does not provide details on civilian and fighter deaths.