U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Hamas on Monday to swiftly accept Israel’s latest and “extraordinarily generous” proposal for a Gaza truce to secure a release of hostages, amid a diplomatic drive to end the .
Hamas negotiators were expected to meet Qatari and Egyptian mediators in Cairo on Monday to deliver a response to the phased truce proposal Israel presented at the weekend, ahead of a threatened Israeli assault on the southern border city of Rafah.
“The only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a ceasefire is Hamas. They have to decide and they have to decide quickly,” Blinken said at a special meeting of the World Economic Forum held in the Saudi capital Riyadh.
“I’m hopeful that they will make the right decision.”
A source briefed on the talks said Israel’s proposal entailed a deal to accept the release of fewer than 40 of the roughly 130 hostages believed to be still held in exchange for freeing Palestinians jailed in Israel, and a second phase of a truce consisting of a “period of sustained calm” – Israel’s compromise response to a Hamas demand for permanent ceasefire.
Blinken arrived in Saudi Arabia on Monday, the first stop in the latest of a series of trouble-shooting trips to the Middle East since the Gaza war ignited in October, destabilising the wider tinderbox region.
Click this link for the original source of this article.
Author: Faith N
This content is courtesy of, and owned and copyrighted by, https://www.offthepress.com and its author. This content is made available by use of the public RSS feed offered by the host site and is used for educational purposes only. If you are the author or represent the host site and would like this content removed now and in the future, please contact USSANews.com using the email address in the Contact page found in the website menu.