Friday 2 August 2024

Are ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas now doomed?

Israel was never really interested in ceaefire talks to end the war in Gaza until three key Hamas leaders had been killed. Well, two of the three are now dead. But I suspect until the Israel Defence Forces or Mossad can find and eliminate the head of Hamas in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, there will be no real sense of urgency about trying to forge a ceasefire. So until then, the war will go on. And anyway I guess Hamas is not going to be in any sort of mood to do any deal with Israel after the assassination of its top political leader in a bomb explosion in Tehran and the military commander in Gaza in an airstrike. Even Joe Biden had to admit today that the killing of the Hamas political leader Ismail Haniya would not help the ceasefire negotiations because he was the man leading the talks for Hamas in Qatar. Israel had already killed two of his sons in an airstrike in Gaza. So what hopes for a ceasefire and a return of the Israeli hostages in the near future? About zero. And just when Biden thought the negotiations were beginning to look like they might get wrapped up soon. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, must be one of the most difficult allies to work with when Biden wants to bring peace to the Middle East and Netanyahu wants revenge against Israel's enemies. There's not a lot of compromise potential between those two extremes.

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