It comes after the terror group turned down a proposal put forward by Egypt that would have seen a two-day ceasefire declared in Gaza if they had agreed to return four Israeli hostages.
Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, said Hamas “once again refused to release even a limited number of hostages to secure a ceasefire and relief for the people of Gaza”.
Taher al-Nunu, a Hamas official, told AFP that the idea of a “temporary pause in the war, only to resume aggression later, is something we have already expressed our position on. Hamas supports a permanent end to the war, not a temporary one”.
Meanwhile, David Barnea, the director of Mossad who heads the Israeli negotiations team, reportedly told the families of hostages that the chances of reaching a deal are slim.
“We still haven’t got any response from the mediators, neither for the Qatari proposal nor the Egyptian one, in any official capacity, so it’s best to wait. Right now the chances for a deal are very slim,” he said, according to Channel 12.
It follows the arrest of Eli Feldstein, Mr Netanyahu’s spokesman, who is accused of leaking sensitive intelligence documents from the IDF.
Mr Feldstein, 32, who failed a security background check before entering his role last year, allegedly leaked a story suggesting Hamas was not interested in reaching a ceasefire deal. The scandal sparked an intense debate in Israel over Mr Netanyahu’s role in the affair.
