"A ceasefire is on the table today, for six weeks to be built on into something more enduring if Hamas would simply release women, wounded and elderly," White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters
Hamas says it will only accept a deal based on a permanent ceasefire that ends the war and includes an Israeli troop withdrawal from Gaza, rather than another temporary truce.
"We're determined to try to generate a ceasefire where at least six weeks with the hostages coming out and then try to build on that into something more enduring, but I can't make any predictions about where this will lie," Sullivan said.
If they're going to declare arbitrary subsets of the hostages, why stop at female? Why not demand only the short hostages, or only the ones with blue eyes?
I think it's just the lower likelihood that they will end up as combatants. If you're in a military conflict you're generally more likely to hand over hostages that are less likely to come back and fight you
In my opinion, I don't feel like they care about hamas demands and if they did it would be like admitting to their accusations. I'm not very smart so I could be wrong.
I get the same feeling too. Like they're throwing a tantrum and expecting reality to bend to their wills (which has been Israel's modus operandi for the last... century?)
Israel doesn't care about Hamas's demands. Pretty standard practice all over the world not to negotiate with terrorists, let alone give them a country. It's never going to happen. Hamas can surrender and maybe live if they give up the hostages, or they can be killed to the man even if it takes another twenty years. They are defeated and completely outmatched, they have nothing to offer at the bargaining table except the hostages and Israel is willing to write them off if it averts another twenty years of terror attacks.
Exactly, and that was a disaster in every sense of the word. Which is why Hamas is refusing the current offer (not like Israel likes it very much either), because the promise that "we'll start with a temporary ceasefire and turn it into something more enduring" was made before in November and in the end Hamas lost half their hostages for a whole lot of nothing. Even a random guy watching from the sidelines like me can tell; even if the 6-week ceasefire succeeds and becomes permanent, it'll come at the cost of Israel occupying Gaza, or at least half of it, and that's assuming it succeeds and Israel doesn't continue doing their thing in six weeks.
PS: I don't remember when it was either, could've been December.
HAMAS ALREADY OFFERED EVERY HOSTAGE AND ISRAEL SAID NO.
Fuck this man, every fucking lie will be twisted to make Hamas look like the bloodthirsty goons while Israel parades its slaughter and destruction and sells the rubble to fascists.
The only fascists in Gaza are Hamas. Israel is a democracy, I'm surprised you didn't know. It's kind of a central factor in western policy on this matter.