By Ryan Morgan
Contributing Writer
President Joe Biden announced on Friday that Israeli and Hamas negotiators have both agreed to a framework for Hamas to release hostages and for both sides to impose a cease-fire in the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.
Biden said this development stems from a three-phase peace proposal he laid out on May 31. Progress on the proposal had slowed in June after Hamas requested changes to the framework, but the Biden administration has signaled some headway in recent days.
“There is still work to do and these are complex issues, but that framework is now agreed to by both Israel and Hamas,” Biden announced in a Friday social media post. “My team is making progress and I’m determined to get this done.”
The announcement was made nine months into the conflict, which began after Hamas fighters carried out widespread attacks across southern Israel, and took around 250 people back to the Gaza Strip as hostages.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly expressed a wartime goal to free all of the hostages, eliminate Hamas, and ensure no new threat to Israel can persist in the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu’s office reiterated some of those objectives, in a Thursday press statement, amid the reports of renewed deliberations on the cease-fire framework.
“Any outline must allow Israel to return to fighting until all the objectives of the war are achieved,” the Israeli Prime Minister’s office said.
Netanyahu’s office further said Israel would not allow weapons to flow into the Gaza Strip from Egypt or “the return of armed terrorists and the entry of war materiel to the northern Gaza Strip.”
The Israeli prime minister’s office also said his team will insist that Hamas releases “the maximum number of living hostages” possible in the first phase of a multi-part cease-fire framework.
According to the terms Biden described on May 31, the first phase of the peace framework entails a temporary cease-fire period of at least six weeks. During this time, Israeli troops would pull back from the populated areas of the Gaza Strip. Hamas would release civilian hostages and Israel would release Palestinians detained by Israel.
Biden said the first phase of the peace framework would also see a surge of humanitarian assistance, with 600 truckloads of supplies reaching the embattled territory daily.
Biden said the second phase of the peace framework would hinge on negotiations, but that the six-week cease-fire would be extended if the parties remain committed to those talks. If the negotiations prove successful, the second phase would see Hamas release the remaining hostages, consisting primarily of captured Israeli troops. In turn, Biden said the temporary cease-fire would become permanent and Israeli forces would withdraw from the Gaza Strip.
Finally, in the third phase of the framework, Biden said Israel would permit reconstruction to begin in the Gaza Strip. In return, Hamas would return the remains of any hostages killed during the war.
The negotiations have largely played out behind closed doors. It’s not entirely clear what changes have been made to the plan Biden laid out on May 31, and what new terms may now be on the table.
