There has been no progress in talks with Israel on a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, a senior Palestinian Hamas official said in Beirut on Saturday.
A plan presented by US President Joe Biden last month, which he said was proposed by Israel, included a six-week ceasefire accompanied by Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas and the release of some hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.
According to US news site Axios, “three sources with direct knowledge” said Washington had submitted “new language for parts” of the proposed agreement.
On Saturday, Lebanon-based Hamas official Osama Hamdan confirmed that the Islamist movement had received the latest proposal on June 24, but that it contained “nothing new”.
“We can say that there has been no real progress so far in the talks to stop the (Israeli) aggression,” he told a news conference.
The plan put forward by Biden has so far failed to result in an agreement, and both sides remain adamant on their demands.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that he will continue the war until Hamas is completely defeated and all hostages are freed.
Hamas is insisting on a permanent ceasefire and a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip.
Hamdan said these proposals “are only a waste of time and provide the occupier (Israel) with additional time to commit genocide”.
He also said Hamas was being pressured to accept Israel’s agreement “without any amendments”.
The war began with a Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7, resulting in the deaths of 1,195 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP count based on Israeli data.
The militants have also seized hostages, 116 of them in Gaza itself, though the military says 42 have been killed.
Israel’s retaliatory strikes have killed at least 37,834 people, the vast majority of them civilians, according to health ministry figures in Hamas-run Gaza.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)