Blinken visits Egypt and Qatar as the US pressures Hamas to agree to a revised deal allowing Israel to keep troops in Gaza.
Hamas has said that a ceasefire agreement must lead to a permanent end to Israel’s war against Gaza. The US is accused of wanting to “merely buy time so that Israel can continue its genocide” with its proposal to change the agreement.
As the Palestinian group announced details of Israel’s new terms, it called on the world to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to sign the deal proposed by US President Joe Biden on May 31 and backed by the UN Security Council on June 11.
“The Israelis have backed away from the issues included in Biden’s proposal. Netanyahu’s talk of agreeing to an updated proposal shows that the US administration has failed to convince him to accept the previous agreement,” Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan told Al Jazeera on Monday.
On Tuesday, Biden said Hamas would “withdraw” from the agreement reached with Israel.
“It’s still in play, but you can’t predict it,” he said as he left the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. “Israel says they can handle it… Hamas is now pulling out.”
Hamdan’s comments came after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in Tel Aviv on Monday that he had “a very constructive meeting” with Netanyahu, who “confirmed that Israel accepts the bridging proposal”.
“This is a pivotal moment – probably the best, perhaps the last opportunity to bring the (Israeli) hostages home, achieve a ceasefire, and put everyone on a better path to lasting peace and security,” Blinken said.
The Israeli military said on Tuesday it had recovered the bodies of six prisoners from Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip.
The US presented its latest proposal last week after new talks in Qatar’s capital Doha.
Hamas said the new proposal met Netanyahu’s conditions, including his rejection of a ceasefire, a complete troop withdrawal from Gaza and his insistence on controlling the Netzarim Corridor, which separates the north from the south of the enclave, the Rafah border crossing and the Philadelphia Corridor on the border with Egypt.
Blinken traveled to the Egyptian Mediterranean city of El Alamein on Tuesday to hold talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi at his summer palace.
He will then travel to Doha for a meeting with the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.
Egypt and Qatar are working side by side with the United States to negotiate a ceasefire in the ten-month-long Gaza conflict.
The Biden framework calls for a freeze on fighting for an initial six weeks while Israeli prisoners are exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and humanitarian aid is allowed to reach Gaza.
Netanyahu said on Monday that the aim of negotiators was to “release as many live hostages as possible” in the first phase of a ceasefire.
At least 40,139 people have been killed and 92,743 injured in Israel’s war on Gaza, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry. An estimated 1,139 people were killed and more than 200 captured in Israel in the Hamas-led attacks on October 7.
