TEL AVIV: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected a plan put forward by Hamas for a multi-stage truce and hostage release, which would have effectively left the Palestinian militant group in power.
Netanyahu made the comments Wednesday shortly after meeting the visiting U.S. secretary of state, Antony Blinken, who has been traveling the region in hopes of securing a cease-fire agreement.
As the war enters its fifth month, Hamas is putting up stiff resistance across the war-ravaged territory. Netanyahu vowed to press ahead with Israel’s military offensive in Gaza until achieving “absolute victory,” adding that the operation would last months, not years.
Israel's military has so far ordered Palestinians to evacuate two-thirds of the tiny coastal enclave. Many of the displaced are living in squalid tent camps near Gaza's southern border with Egypt and in overflowing U.N.-run shelters. A quarter of Gaza’s residents are starving.
The Palestinian death toll has reached 27,707 people, the Health Ministry in Gaza said. That includes 123 bodies brought to hospitals in just the last 24 hours, it said Wednesday.
The war began with Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault into Israel, in which militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted around 250. Hamas is still holding over 130 hostages, but around 30 of them are believed to be dead.