Israeli negotiators have offered a major concession in ceasefire talks with Hamas, signaling they may be open to releasing high-profile Palestinians jailed on terror charges in exchange for some Israeli hostages still being held in the Gaza Strip, two officials said. knowledge of conversations.
President Biden said Monday he believed negotiators were nearing a deal that would end Israel’s military operations in Gaza within a week, although earlier in the day Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was still talking about further military action .
Mr Netanyahu said the Israeli military had presented a plan to the war cabinet to remove civilians from “battle zones” in Gaza. He appeared to be talking about Israel’s long-awaited invasion of Rafah, the southern city where more than half of Gaza’s population is taking refuge, many in makeshift tents.
Mr Netanyahu did not reveal any details of the evacuation plan and it was unclear whether he was using the prospect of an invasion as a thorn in his side to gain leverage in negotiations. On Sunday, he said an invasion could be “delayed somewhat” if Hamas agreed to release Israeli hostages.
Many countries and international aid organizations have warned that an invasion of Rafah could lead to mass casualties on top of the nearly 30,000 Gazans who, according to regional health officials, have already been killed in the war.
Speaking to reporters in New York on Monday, Mr. Biden sounded optimistic about a deal to end the fighting. “We’re close,” he said. “We’re not done yet. I hope that next Monday we will have a ceasefire.”
As talks with the hostages continued, the two officials said Israeli negotiators had privately agreed to a United States proposal that would free five Israeli soldiers held in Gaza in exchange for the release of 15 Palestinians convicted of serious terrorism charges.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the discussions, which took place during a meeting with officials from Egypt, Qatar and the United States in Paris last week.
The Netanyahu government had previously avoided such a concession, in part because releasing Palestinians linked to major terrorist acts, even in exchange for Israeli hostages, could expose it to significant domestic criticism.
Asked about the position of the negotiators, Mr. Netanyahu’s office declined to comment.
The reported concession came as officials scrambled to reach an agreement before the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in about two weeks. An Israeli delegation was expected to arrive in Qatar on Monday to continue negotiations with international mediators.
The concession is part of a broader US proposal that would allow the release of 40 of the roughly 100 hostages taken in the October 7 Hamas attacks who are believed to be still alive in Gaza.
In addition to the five female soldiers, they include 35 civilians, some of whom are sick, injured or weak. Seven of the 35 are women who Israel believes should have been freed during the last ceasefire and prisoner exchange in November. For the release of these seven women, Israel offered to release 21 Palestinians from its prisons, the same three-to-one ratio seen in the previous exchange.
The release of male Israeli soldiers will be negotiated separately, one of the officials said.
Hamas has not responded to the offer. The group demanded that Israel withdraw from Gaza, observe a long-term ceasefire and release Palestinians held in Israeli prisons in exchange for the remaining hostages.
But according to one of the officials, Israeli intelligence officers believe that the leader of Hamas in Gaza, Yahya Shinwar, has become more amenable in recent weeks to a deal that would allow only a temporary truce, in the hope that permanent.
The talks loom over the prospect of an Israeli invasion of Rafah, where more than a million people have taken refuge. Many fled to the city after hearing Israeli orders to evacuate other parts of Gaza and are struggling with food, water and medicine shortages. Now there is nowhere safe in Gaza for them to go, many say.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesman for Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, condemned Mr Netanyahu’s announcement of an evacuation plan, saying it confirmed Israel’s intention “to invade the town of Rafah”. He called on the Biden administration to “stop this Israeli madness.” The authority helps administer the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, said a full-scale Israeli assault on Rafah, which serves as a major entry point for aid from Egypt, “would not only be terrifying for the more than one million Palestinian civilians who take refuge there, but and the final nail in the coffin of our aid programs.”
Mr. Netanyahu’s office said inside a statement that a new plan to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza had been approved following reports that desperate Palestinians had ambushed aid trucks and taken food and other supplies. The government has not released the plan or given further details.
As Israel continued its assault on Gaza, the Israeli military said that in Lebanon, its fighters had hit Hezbollah air defenses in the Bekaa Valley, an area about 60 miles from the Israeli border. The targets were deeper into Lebanon than any area of the country that Israel has hit in recent years.
Israel said the strike was in response to a surface-to-air missile attack that shot down an Israeli drone over southern Lebanon. Hezbollah had claimed responsibility for the attack.
At least two Hezbollah fighters were killed in the Israeli airstrikes and at least six others were wounded, according to Bachir Khodor, mayor of the nearby town of Baalbek. Video of the scene provided by Mr. Khodor, which could not be independently verified, showed a building in ruins and people on stretchers being loaded into an ambulance.
The Bekaa Valley, a fertile plain that runs along the Syrian border, has long been a stronghold for Hezbollah, the politically powerful Lebanese militia that has been engaged in near-daily clashes with Israeli forces since October 7. The fighting has displaced more than 150,000 people on both sides of the Lebanon-Israel border and left hundreds dead.
The Israeli military later confirmed it had killed a Hezbollah commander in a targeted strike earlier in the day in southern Lebanon. Hezbollah announced the death of the fighter in a statement, but did not give details of his rank.
In a statement, Hezbollah said it responded by firing rockets at an Israeli army headquarters in the Golan Heights, the plateau Israel captured in 1967. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the statement.
The strikes came after Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Sunday that the army “plans to increase firepower against Hezbollah” and that it would not stop operations along the border with Lebanon even if there was a temporary halt. fighting in Gaza.
“We will increase the fire in the north separately and continue until the complete withdrawal of Hezbollah and the return of Israeli civilians to their homes,” he said.
Hassan Fadlallah, a Hezbollah lawmaker in the Lebanese parliament, said Monday that the latest round of Israeli strikes “will not go unanswered.”
The report was made by Peter Baker, Julian E. Barnes, Mike Ives, Nick Cumming-Bruce, Hwaida Saad, Euan Ward and Jonathan Rice.
