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Hamas officials deny dropping out of hostage negotiations

In contradictory messaging, following the Israeli attack on top terrorist leaders, Hamas had said it was withdrawing from the talks.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Two senior Hamas officials denied Sunday a report that the Gazan terror group was leaving the negotiating table following Israel’s attack Saturday targeting top Hamas military leaders.

Izzat El-Reshiq, a member of the terrorists’ “political” bureau, said that Agence France Presse (AFP) had published a “baseless” report.

On Sunday, an unnamed “senior Hamas official” told AFP that the terror group had made the “decision to halt negotiations due to [Israel’s] lack of seriousness, continued policy of procrastination and obstruction, and the ongoing massacres against unarmed civilians.”

El-Reshiq instead accused the Israeli “Nazi” government of “escalating” the war in Gaza because “one of its goals is to block the path to reaching an agreement that stops the aggression against our people.”

Another member of Hamas political wing, Osama Hamdan, also rejected the AFP report.

He told Lebanese paper Al-Nahar, “This is absolutely not true, and Israel is the one trying to avoid the negotiations. It avoids giving a clear answer to what was discussed during the last talks, and on the other hand, escalates with massacres to embarrass the mediators.”

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This was also in line with an Israel Hayom report that Hamas’ political head, Qatar-based Ismail Haniyeh, had talked Saturday night after the Israeli airstrike with various negotiators in the hostages-for-ceasefire talks and said that Israel was the one putting up obstacles “to prevent an agreement.”

The IDF had attacked what it called a Hamas compound within a huge tent camp set up for Gazan civilians, due to intelligence that two of their top military leaders were present at the time.

While the terror group did admit that Khan Yunis Brigade commander Rafa’a Salameh had been killed in the airstrike, its officials have claimed that Hamas No. 2 Muhammad Deif, the mastermind behind the October 7 massacre of 1,200 people in Israel, had escaped injury.

In other contradictory messaging regarding the continuation of the negotiations, at least one Hamas official indicated Sunday that the Iranian proxy had informed the mediators of the decision to drop out before the assassination attempt.

Hamas spokesperson Jihad Taha was reported as saying that “The negotiations were stopped a few days ago as a result of the Israeli lack of compliance and the insistence on placing conditions outside of the offer that was agreed upon.”

Then again, a senior Hamas official told Lebanon’s Hezbollah-affiliated Al Mayadeen TV that Hamas had sent a warning to the negotiators that talks “could collapse” at any time.

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The Israeli government is reportedly ignoring all the clashing statements, assuming that the talks have not yet broken down.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did reject the claims that Israel was the obstacle to an agreement, saying that he “won’t budge a millimeter” from the deal that the United States had put on the table while Hamas “has made 29 changes.”