White House: We Can Get Ceasefire Deal We Want with ‘Compromise’ ‘on Both Sides’

On Thursday’s “CNN News Central,” White House National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby stated that “with some compromise and some leadership, on both sides here,” a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas can be reached.

Kirby said, “[W]e believe that the gaps that are remaining…are of such a narrow nature that they can they can easily be breached. Now, I say easily, that’s probably not a great choice of words on my part, because if it was easy, we’d be there by now. But what I mean is that they are narrow enough that, with some compromise and some leadership, on both sides here, we believe that we can get this over the finish line. We’re close. And as I said earlier, closer than we’ve been before. We’re still not there though. So, there’s still work that needs to be done.”

Co-host Brianna Keilar then asked, “Why should we not read this then simply as pressure on Israel by the U.S. to get a deal done, considering pressure on Israel in the past has failed and it easily can be construed as that?”

Kirby responded, “Look, this isn’t about some sort of pressure tactic. We have been very strident in our negotiations with our counterparts, again, on both sides of this conflict, that this framework deal will work. It will get the hostages home, it will get us six weeks of a ceasefire, and it will dramatically improve the ability for humanitarian assistance to get around inside Gaza. There’s a lot of goodness here. It’s really just a matter of working out the final details. So, if it’s — if you want to say that we’re putting pressure on both sides because we are working on it so hard and continue to put teams in the field there, well, then I guess, okay, we’re putting pressure on both sides. We want to get this done.”

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