Talks Have Failed

We’re told in an article from The Jerusalem Post that both sides see the current negotiations as going nowhere:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to hold consultations on Saturday evening following the Israeli delegation's return from Gaza hostage deal talks in the Qatari capital of Doha.

Israel accused Hamas of deviating from the American proposal for a ceasefire extension after the terror organization announced on Friday that it had agreed to release American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander from Gaza captivity.

Hamas, for its part counter-offered with releasing American hostages and remains:

Hamas also said it would return the remains of four deceased hostages with American citizenship: Omer Neutra, Itay Chen, Gadi Haggai, and Judy Weinstein Haggai. Israeli officials previously confirmed the deaths of all four hostages named by Hamas.

I’m sure that the talks behind the scenes are not what we’re seeing in public as the rhetoric from the US side is getting more and more terse about Hamas:

US special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff dismissed Hamas's offer on Friday, warning the Palestinian terror organization that it could no longer play for time with a ceasefire and hostage deal. 

Even Hamas is saying the talks have failed:

Earlier on Saturday, Hamas officials told BBC Arabic that discussions on the continuation of a Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal have failed.

Strangely the same article cites a source that somehow thinks Israel will not go back to fighting Hamas:

Additionally, Dr. Tarek Fahmy, a professor of political science, told the BBC that despite a lack of movement in talks, he does not believe fighting will continue in the same capacity it did before the recent ceasefire. Fahmy stressed he believed "there will be no resumption of the war, despite reports that Israel is preparing to launch qualitative strikes" after the ceasefire expires.

Fahmy is surely uniformed about the 400,000 Israeli troops amassing on the Gaza border and the statements being made by Netanyahu, Witkoff, and the IDF that the fighting will not only restart, but that it will be more intense than before.

Ridiculous Terms

The US Secretary of State has some strong words about Hamas in regards to the ongoing hostage negotiations as we see in a report on them from the Jewish News Syndicate:

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday slammed as “nuts” the terms being demanded by Hamas in hostage-ceasefire negotiations, while insisting the Trump administration was committed to freeing all of the 59 captives held by the Palestinian terrorist group in Gaza.

Rubio then gave details of the talks and for the first time common sense is being heard about the trade parameters especially with the number of prisoners for hostages:

“We care about all the hostages, we want all the hostages released. … But we’re also talking about bodies. And these trades that are being made, they’re ridiculous trades—400 people for three. These are nuts,” Rubio said at a press conference during the G7 Foreign Ministers Meeting in Charlevoix, Quebec. 

He then put Hamas and what they’ve done in perspective for a world that somehow has sympathy for the terrorists:

“On top of that, you see the condition these people are being released in. … We’re sitting around as the world, sort of accepting that it’s normal and okay for you to go into a place, kidnap babies, kidnap teenagers, kidnap people who have nothing to do with any wars, that are not soldiers … and taking them and putting them in tunnels for almost a year and a half,” he continued.

Rubio wasn’t through with his strong assessment of Hamas, again stating things that the previous administration didn’t have the temerity to say:

“The whole world should continue to say that what Hamas has done is outrageous, it’s ridiculous, it’s sick, it’s disgusting. … We’re just dealing with some savages. That’s it. These are bad people, terrible people, and we need to treat them as such,” added Rubio.

There will still be those who say it is Israel that is genocidal and is killing women, children, and babies when it reality it is and has been Hamas that does those things. And now we have a US administration that has no problem making that point. The world is losing patience with Hamas and only the most ardent antisemites can’t accept that fact. These people are steeped in their hatred for Israel and Jews and will even pervert history to support their views. To them Hamas is being treated poorly and the Gazans are the innocents who are being slaughtered even when given evidence to the contrary. Hamas are the brutal terrorists who are keeping its people from leaving the area when they want to and builds their outposts in and under hospitals, schools, mosques, and even in the bedrooms of babies. They are the ones who have indoctrinated their citizens for decades to hate Jews and encourage them to be suicidal martyrs even as children. Rubio is exactly right and hopefully he and others will start exposing Hamas and really all Middle Eastern terrorists for who they really are. It can’t happen soon enough.