Israel cannot accept Hamas demands, says Netanyahu

FE Team | Published: May 05, 2024 21:46:03

JERUSALEM, May 05 (BBC/Reuters): Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel will not accept Hamas's demands for Israel to end the Gaza war. It comes as negotiators were resuming talks in Egypt to broker a pause in Israel's Gaza offensive in return for the release of hostages taken by Hamas.
The main sticking point appears to be if the truce will be permanent - as Hamas insists - or not. Mr Netanyahu said the proposed deal would keep Hamas in control of Gaza, posing a threat to Israel.
It is thought the wording being discussed in the Cairo talks involves a 40-day pause in fighting while hostages are released, and the release of a number of Palestinian prisoners being held in Israeli jails.
An adviser to the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said the group was looking at the latest proposal with "full seriousness". But he repeated a demand that any deal would have to explicitly include an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and complete end to the war.
Speaking on Sunday, Mr Netanyahu said: "We are not ready to accept a situation in which the Hamas battalions come out of their bunkers, take control of Gaza again, rebuild their military infrastructure, and return to threatening the citizens of Israel in the surrounding communities, in the cities of the south, in all parts of the country."
"Israel will not agree to Hamas' demands," he added. Separately, an anonymous Israeli government official told local media on Saturday that Israel would "under no circumstances agree to end the war as part of an agreement to free our abductees".
Five Palestinians killed
in West Bank raid
Israeli forces killed five Palestinians in an overnight raid in a village near the city of Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank, according to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa, which cited Palestinian security sources.
The security sources and a Reuters reporter at the scene said that Israeli forces had taken some of the bodies following the raid in the village of Deir al-Ghusun. The Israeli military said it was conducting "counterterrorism activities in the area".
Ireland, Switzerland students
join Gaza protest wave
Students at Trinity College Dublin and Lausanne University in Switzerland have staged occupations to protest against Israel's war in Gaza, joining a wave of demonstrations sweeping US campuses.
In Dublin, students built an encampment on Friday that forced the university to restrict campus access on Saturday and close the Book of Kells exhibition, one of Ireland's top tourist attractions.
The camp was set up after the students' union said it had been fined 214,000 euros ($230,000) by the university for losses caused by protests in recent months, not exclusively over Gaza. The protesters were demanding that Trinity cut academic ties with Israel and divest from companies with ties to Israel.