The United States is working on a proposal to secure the release of all the remaining 101 hostages in Gaza and to stop the fighting in that enclave, US National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby told reporters on Tuesday as skepticism was high that an agreement could be finalized.
“Our team is still working on trying to get this to closure,” he said. US President Joe Biden was “going to stay 110% focused on seeing if we can't get this over the finish line and to do so as soon as humanly possible,” he stressed.
“We're working on a proposal that will secure the release of the remaining hostages,” Kirby said. This proposal would “include massive and immediate relief for the people of Gaza, and also result in a stoppage of the fighting.”
Kirby said he had heard reports of an “all or nothing deal,” but that “all I'm telling you is our team is still working on trying to get this to closure, to try to conclude a deal that achieves all those three things.”
Qatar and Egypt have been the main mediators for the deal with the help of the US. Kirby said that the US was in constant communication with Qatar and Egypt.
Those two Arab countries have been in touch with Hamas, he said, adding that he did not have a timeline for when the work would be concluded.
He referred to the Hamas execution over the weekend of six of the hostages, including Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, who held dual Israeli-American citizenship.
“The killing over the weekend just underscores the sense of urgency” to finalize a deal, Kirby said.
Israel has been braced in the last few days to receive a non-negotiable Gaza hostage deal from Qatar, Egypt, and the United States.
“I think that what will happen in the end” is that “there will be a kind of take it or leave” deal which Biden would put forward “together with the Egyptians and the Qataris,” Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman Yuli Edelstein told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday morning.
“Then we will have to make a decision,” because “it won’t be negotiable again,” he said.
'On same page with Americans'
Edelstein speculated that his latest draft could more likely be authored by Qatar and Egypt and might include terms less favorable to Israel when compared to the bridging proposal the US had put on the table in August.
“We are now pretty much on the same page with the Americans. “I think that there will be a Qatari, Egyptian proposal that will be put on the table together with Biden, or coordinated with Biden, “We are now pretty much on the same page with the Americans” with regard to the terms of the deal, Edelstein said.
“I'm not sure [this next proposal] will be as okay as the American proposal [was] for us,” he said, in referencing the latest draft of the deal, which at its core had actually begun with a text authored by Israel.
Edelstein acknowledged that “We have to get out of the situation where we are stuck and do something. I'm not getting into specific details of why, what, or how, but I think that it's not helpful to be stuck for such a long time.”
Mossad Chief David Barnea who has been one of the key figures in the Israeli negotiating team was in Doha on Monday and spoke with Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Al-Thani about a deal for the return of the remaining 101 hostages in Gaza, of which 66 are estimated to be alive.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a public press conference on Monday night after the six executed hostages had been buried. He underscored that he would be flexible on many of the deal's terms, but would not agree to withdraw IDF forces from a critical buffer zone known as the Philadelphi Corridor.
Biden held talks with his top team at the White House on Monday about a deal, even though it was Labor Day weekend in the US.
Biden has warned Hamas that it will pay a price for the death of the hostages and told reporters before the White House meeting that Netanyahu had not done enough to finalize a deal.
Biden said he remained hopeful that a deal was possible and that he was working with Qatar and Egypt on a proposal to give to Israel and Hamas.
"We're in the middle of negotiations,” he told reporters, but he clarified that these talks were not with Netanyahu.