(AFP) – Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu met for the second time in 24 hours Tuesday as the US president intensified the pressure on the Israeli prime minister to reach a deal to end the “tragedy” of the war in Gaza. Netanyahu’s return to the White House for fresh talks came after Qatari mediators warned it would take time to seal an elusive ceasefire between Israeli and Hamas at talks in Doha.
“It’s a tragedy, and he wants to get it solved, and I want to get it solved, and I think the other side wants to,” Trump told reporters as he announced that Netanyahu was coming back. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said he hoped for an agreement within days. “We are hopeful that by end of this week we will have an agreement that will bring us into a 60-day ceasefire,” Witkoff said. The deal would include the return of 10 live hostages held by Palestinian militant groups since Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel, and nine dead hostages, Witkoff added. The Israeli leader, who had dinner with Trump on Monday evening, arrived back at the White House for talks that were being held without any media access. Asked earlier as he met US House speaker Mike Johnson if a ceasefire announcement was imminent, Netanyahu replied: “We’re certainly working on it.”
Trump has kept up strong US support for Israel, especially over the recent Iran-Israel war, but has also been stepping up the pressure to end what he calls the “hell” in Gaza. Qatar, however, said Tuesday more time was needed for negotiations for a breakthrough between Israel and Hamas, as indirect negotiations extended into a third day in Doha. “I don’t think that I can give any timeline at the moment, but I can say right now that we will need time for this,” Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesman Majed Al-Ansari said. Qatar, a mediator along with the United States and Egypt, said the meetings in Doha were focused on a framework for the talks, while a Palestinian official close to the negotiations said no breakthrough had been achieved so far.
Hostilities meanwhile continued on the ground. Gaza’s civil defense reported 29 killed in Israeli strikes on Tuesday, including three children. Five Israeli soldiers were killed in combat in northern Gaza — one of the deadliest days this year for Israeli forces in the Palestinian territory. Netanyahu described the soldiers’ deaths as a “difficult morning.” They were reportedly killed by improvised explosive devices near Beit Hanun in northern Gaza. And Lebanon said three people were killed Tuesday in a strike near Tripoli that the Israeli military said targeted a Hamas militant, the first in the area since a November ceasefire with Hezbollah.
Trump has been trying to seize on the momentum from the recent ceasefire between Iran and Israel, which was precipitated by US airstrikes on Tehran’s nuclear program. France’s foreign intelligence chief said Tuesday that the program has been “very, very delayed” by US and Israeli strikes, wading into a contentious debate over just how hard it was hit. Israel and Hamas began the latest round of negotiations on Sunday, with representatives seated in separate rooms within the same building. An Israeli official accompanying Netanyahu to Washington said the proposal under discussion was “80-90 percent of what Israel wanted.” But far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir opposed negotiations with Hamas, saying that “there is no need to negotiate with those who murder our fighters; they must be torn to shreds.”
The war has created dire humanitarian conditions for Gaza’s more than two million people. The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures. Of 251 hostages taken by Palestinian militants during the attack, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead. Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed at least 57,575 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. The UN considers the figures reliable.
burs-dk/jgc – Danny Kemp with Callum Paton in Doha and Alice Chancellor in Jerusalem.
© 2024 AFP
