The Biden administration has higher expectations for renewed negotiations between Hamas and Israel, now underway in Doha, with added pressure to prevent a full-blown regional war. CIA Director Bill Burr and U.S. envoy Brett McGurk were both part of Thursday’s renewed talks, which the U.S. said got off to a “promising start.” Secretary of State Antony Blinken has held phone conversations with leaders from many of the countries in the region in an attempt to bolster support for the talks.
Vedant Patel, a State Department spokesperson, said the negotiations have the potential to “get this region out of this constant, endless cycle of violence that we’re seeing,” calling attempts to de-escalate regional tensions a “key pillar” of the negotiations. Israel is widely believed to have assassinated a key negotiator for Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran and killed a senior Hezbollah official, Fuad Shukr, in Beirut, leading to even more pressure over the talks. More than 40,000 Palestinians have died in Israel’s strikes on Gaza since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack.
Over the weekend, the Department of Defense moved more assets to the region in anticipation of a possible retaliatory strike from Iran.
In speaking with administration officials, the U.S. and other international parties are hoping that a Gaza cease-fire deal could convince Iran to hold its fire. “The negotiations to reach a cease-fire deal would de-escalate tensions and has the potential to avoid a larger regional conflict,” Department of Defense spokesperson Sabrina Singh told NOTUS.
“It’s not just that. It’s about getting our hostages home. There’s still Americans that are hostages,” Singh said, pointing to the many facets of concern in the conflict. “There’s a lot of components to the cease-fire talk.”
One of those components is a framework President Joe Biden presented to the world in late May. It outlined an initial six-week cease-fire, the exchange of hostages and prisoners by Israel and Hamas and the beginning of infrastructure rebuilding in Gaza.
“We’re at a point now where the framework is generally accepted,” White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters this morning. Moving forward in negotiations, the details of execution are the main points being sorted out by negotiators.
Several meetings to overcome those differences have happened in the 10 weeks since both Hamas and Israel signaled they would back Biden’s plan. None have resulted in any public movement forward. According to Kirby, the talks will continue into the week ahead.
“I’d expect the talks to continue into tomorrow,” Kirby told reporters. “This is vital work. The remaining obstacles can be overcome, and we must bring this process to a close.”
Israel does not want the cease-fire to be permanent, saying that it feels it should be allowed to continue the war if Hamas prolongs talks without reaching an agreement. Iran has said it is Israel that is intentionally slowing negotiations to continue the war.
Both Israel Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Israel Defense Force leader Herzi Halevi reportedly said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new demands for the deal would completely tank any opportunity for a cease-fire.
“There is no security reason to delay the deal. Since we’re speaking candidly, I am telling you that you are making considerations that are not beneficial to the matter,” the Times of Israel quoted Gallant telling Netanyahu during a meeting on the deal.
The talks in Doha, Qatar, represent a last-best chance with growing threats in the region, but one that mediators and the international community think has every opportunity to succeed.
The governments of the United States, Qatar and Egypt said in a statement that in this week’s meeting, they are “prepared to present a final bridging proposal” meant to finally draw a close, however temporary, to the conflict in Gaza.
In Tel Aviv, hundreds of relatives of hostages and Israelis marched in support of a swift deal. Meanwhile, Israel has continued its strikes in Gaza, worsening the humanitarian crisis. Officials in Gaza said strikes hit a school compound being used as a shelter over the weekend, killing dozens.
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John T. Seward is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.