Israel pulled its leading negotiators out of hostage talks in Doha, Qatar, on Tuesday after Hamas toughened its demands in response to a United Nations (UN) Security Council resolution that called for an unconditional ceasefire.
As Breitbart News reported, Hamas dug in on its demands that a ceasefire precede any release of hostages, after the U.S. abstained and allowed UN Security Council Resolution 2728 to pass, with the backing of both Russia and China.
The resolution called for remaining Israeli hostages to be released but did not make a ceasefire conditional on their freedom, as a previous draft resolution, introduced by the U.S. last week and vetoed by Russia and China, had done.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a meeting that the White House had sought with his advisers to discuss an imminent Israeli attack on Hamas in its last stronghold of Rafah, which President Joe Biden opposes.
The White House said that it was “perplexed,” and claimed Netanyahu had overreacted, but Hamas praised the UN Security Council vote and announced it was sticking to its original demand that a ceasefire precede a hostage release.
On Tuesday, Netanyahu’s office released the following statement (translated from Hebrew):
Hamas’s stance clearly demonstrates its utter disinterest in a negotiated deal and attests to the damage done by the UN Security Council’s resolution.
Hamas has once again rejected an American compromise proposal and has repeated its extreme demands: An immediate halt to the war, the complete withdrawal of the IDF from the Gaza Strip and leaving in place its administration so that it can repeat, time and again, the massacre of October 7, as it has promised to do.
Hamas rebuffed all US offers for a compromise, while celebrating the Security Council’s resolution.
Israel will not address Hamas’s delusional demands. Israel will pursue and achieve its just war objectives: Destroying Hamas’s military and governmental capacities, release of all the hostages, and ensuring Gaza will not pose a threat to the people of Israel in the future.
Qatar claimed Tuesday that talks were still continuing. The Times of Israel confirmed that there were still Israeli officials in Doha, despite the departure of negotiators from the Mossad, Israel’s spy agency, which has represented Israel in the talks.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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