GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War Day 642

How Close?

So Close, But Yet So Far Away

We see in a report from The Times Of Israel that a new ceasefire/hostage deal is close:

Following Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting Monday evening with United States President Donald Trump, senior Israeli officials said negotiations on a hostage release and ceasefire deal with Hamas have settled most issues, while touting the supreme coordination between Jerusalem and Washington on Gaza, Iran, and broader regional developments. However, the core issue of bringing the war to an end is unresolved.

According to one Israeli official there is agreement on hostages but not on ending the war:

“On a hostage deal, we are coordinated… We hope it will lead to a breakthrough. Hamas’s response to the Qatari proposal was, in essence, no. But the gaps are small enough for us to enter talks with them, and we hoped the answer would be yes, and then it would take a few days. It can take more time, but we are working on it,” Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, who took part in the White House meeting, told reporters after the dinner.

Hamas and Israel are not talking directly, but that is how the terrorists want it done. If true, a deal is 80-90% done, but it will take time:

As a third round of indirect negotiations on an agreement began in Doha on Tuesday morning, a senior Israeli official told reporters that 80 to 90 percent of the deal with Hamas has already been settled. The final stage of talks could take more than a few days to conclude, the official said.

A spokesman for the Qatari Foreign Ministry said Tuesday that negotiations will “need time.”

Progress is inferred, but only agreement on what to talk about so we need to pump the brakes on things:

“I don’t think that I can give any timeline at the moment, but I can say right now that we will need time for this,” Majed Al-Ansari told a Doha news conference. “What is happening right now is that both delegations are in Doha. We are speaking with them separately on a framework for the talks. So talks have not begun, as of yet, but we are talking to both sides over that framework.”

As we already know, whoever distributes the humanitarian aid is a sticking point:

According to a report in the Qatari newspaper Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, there has been progress made in negotiations on the clause regarding the mechanism for bringing humanitarian aid into Gaza. The report claims that Hamas is demanding that during a ceasefire aid be brought into the Strip by the United Nations, rather than the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

On The Same Page

Israel and the US are seeing eye to eye according to both sides:

Though Netanyahu was expected during his Washington visit to face intense pressure from Trump and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff to move the Gaza talks forward, Israel described complete coordination between the two sides.

“We have an opportunity to finally get a peace deal,” Witkoff, who is slated to fly to Qatar this week to participate in the talks, told reporters just ahead of the dinner meeting.

After the dinner, a senior Israeli official asserted that Israel and the US enjoy “full trust and coordination…Total coordination.”

US President Trump wants a deal quickly:

Mediators in the negotiations for a deal have been notified that Trump expects them to secure an agreement this week, an Arab diplomat and a second individual involved in the talks told The Times of Israel on Monday night.

From the Hamas side the usual red lines remain:

A Palestinian source close to the talks told AFP Tuesday morning that “the discussions are still focused on the mechanisms for implementation, particularly the clauses related to [IDF] withdrawal and humanitarian aid.”

It could just be a matter of territory that Israel leaves from although I think it could get ugly:

Negotiators in Doha also discussed the parameters of Israel’s partial withdrawal from Gaza during the proposed 60-day ceasefire. An Arab diplomat said Israeli officials had arrived with a map outlining their envisioned pullback. While Hamas initially demanded a return to Israeli troop positions from before the March 2 collapse of the previous truce, the diplomat said the group had shown some flexibility.

And of course the issue of a temporary ceasefire or a permanent one isn’t going away at all:

The core dispute — whether the deal would constitute a temporary pause, as Israel insists, or a permanent end to the war, as Hamas demands — remained unresolved.

As I’ve always said, Israel wants Hamas to leave the area for good one way or another:

While the precise criteria that Israel or the US intend for a post-war Gaza remain unclear, Israel’s endgame in the talks envisions a territory in which “there is no more Hamas,” a senior Israeli official said in Washington Tuesday morning.

The goal is to see “Hamas taken apart. It has to lay down its weapons. Its people have given up. The leaders have been exiled. Another force has taken over the territory and prevents the use of weapons,” the official said.

Israel wants the Gaza Strip to be one of stability before they let someone else run the area:

“There has to be a system there that manages life,” the official added, saying. “Maybe for a certain amount of time, it is us…I’m not sure that if we’re not there for a certain stage, that we’ll be able to pass it on to someone else.”

This source also brought up the controversial idea of Gazans to leave the area on their own:

The official also said that Israel is convinced Trump is serious about encouraging Gazans to emigrate.

“After tonight, I am [convinced],” the official said, adding that “the plan is alive, what is needed is operational coordination, not only the aims, but how we achieve it. And that is what we discussed. The desire is there.”

From a Bible prophecy standpoint, the land was given to the tribe of Judah and will be given back to Israel while the people including Hamas are judged to leave permanently. This is seen in Zephaniah 2:4-7. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem specifically now so the Israeli leadership understands the times and knows what to do about them.