NBC reported – today, Monday – that the administration of President Joe Biden discussed the possibility of negotiating with the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) through Qatari mediation to release 5 American detainees if the current ceasefire talks fail, amid Israeli denials of knowledge of the matter.
The American network quoted informed officials as saying that negotiating an agreement between the Biden administration and the Hamas movement is a possible option if the current proposal presented by the president on May 31 fails.
She added, quoting officials, that the Biden administration also hopes to recover the remains of 3 citizens believed to have been killed in the attack of last October 7, and whose bodies were subsequently transferred to Gaza, or who died during captivity.
The officials did not mention to the network what the United States might offer Hamas in exchange for the release of American detainees.
But the officials said Hamas may have an incentive to make a unilateral deal with the United States because doing so would likely further strain relations between Washington and Israel and put additional internal pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, they said.
Officials also reported that the US administration discussed whether the United States concluding a unilateral deal with Hamas might pressure Netanyahu to agree to the current ceasefire proposal.
For its part, the Broadcasting Corporation quoted Israeli officials as saying that they did not know that the Biden administration was considering negotiating with Hamas to release American detainees.
Determination for war
Regarding the process of recovering the four Israeli detainees in Nuseirat in the middle of the Gaza Strip, American officials confirmed that this process will make it difficult for Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s efforts to reach an agreement, with the start of his new visit to the region.
They added that this operation only strengthened Netanyahu’s determination to continue the war in Gaza, instead of committing to stop the fighting.
Israel estimates that there are about 120 detainees held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, suggesting that 43 of them died in captivity, while there are no statistics showing the number of American detainees among them.
It is noteworthy that since the beginning of the war on the seventh of last October, a number of Israeli detainees have been killed or injured by the ongoing occupation fire and bombing of the besieged Gaza Strip.