ISRAEL IS READY TO HALT ITS WAR IN GAZA DURING RAMADAN IF HOSTAGE DEAL REACHED: BIDEN

Tue 26 February 2024:

US President Joe Biden on Monday said that Israel would halt its war in Gaza during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan if a hostage-release deal is reached.

“Ramadan’s coming up and there has been an agreement by the Israelis that they would not engage in activities during Ramadan as well, in order to give us time to get all the hostages out,” Biden said in an appearance on NBC’s talk show.

Biden also stressed that he hopes a cease-fire will be reached in the Gaza Strip by March 4.

The negotiations – mediated by Egypt, Qatar and the US – seek to secure a six-week-long pause in fighting between Israel and Hamas to allow aid into Gaza, where the United Nations says some 2.3 million people are on the brink of famine.

The proposed pause would also allow for the release of dozens of captives held by Hamas in return for the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

Biden, when asked when he thought a ceasefire could begin, said he hoped for a truce to take effect within days.

“Well, I hope by the beginning of the weekend, by the end of the weekend,” he told reporters at an ice cream shop in New York. “My national security adviser tells me that we’re close. We’re close. We’re not done yet. My hope is, by next Monday, we’ll have a ceasefire.”

The US leader gave more details of what a deal could look like when asked about efforts to end the conflict by late-night television show host Seth Meyers. He said Israel has agreed to halt military activities in Gaza for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which is likely to begin on March 10 and end on April 9.

Biden went on to warn that Israel risked losing international support due to the high death toll among Palestinians, adding that Israel had committed to make it possible for Palestinians to evacuate before its planned assault on Rafah, the city in southern Gaza where 1.4 million people, many of them displaced by war, have sought safety.

Israel has launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 cross-border incursion by the Palestinian group Hamas, killing at least 29,782 people and causing mass destruction and shortages of necessities, while nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed.

Biden’s comments came a day after his NSA Jake Sullivan said representatives from Israel, Egypt, Qatar and the US discussed the terms of a ceasefire deal in Paris over the weekend and had come to “an understanding” about the contours of such an agreement.

The talks in the French capital did not include representatives from Hamas.

The Reuters news agency, citing Egyptian security sources, reported the Paris meeting would be followed by proximity talks involving delegates from Israel and Hamas, first in Qatar and later in Cairo.

Hamas has its political office in the Qatari capital, Doha.

In Qatar on Monday, the country’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani met Hamas’s political leader Ismail Haniyeh and discussed efforts to reach an “immediate and durable ceasefire agreement in the Gaza Strip”, according to the Qatar News Agency.

Following the meeting, Haniyeh said Hamas welcomed mediators’ efforts to find an end to the war and accused Israel of stalling while the people of Gaza die under siege.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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