The Middle East is poised at a critical juncture between a potential Gaza ceasefire and a dangerous escalation in the war, as Israel awaits the Hamas answer to the latest Egyptian truce proposal.
The militant group is expected to present its response by Wednesday night and, if there is a positive answer, an Israeli delegation will travel to Cairo for talks on the details, including how many hostages will be released in the first stage.
Nevertheless prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, under intense pressure from his far-right coalition partners to continue the fighting, vowed on Tuesday that Israeli forces would enter Rafah, at the southern tip of Gaza, with or without a deal.
“The idea that we will end the war before achieving all of our objectives is unacceptable,” he told families of hostages held by Hamas and soldiers killed in the war. “We will enter Rafah and obliterate all the Hamas battalions there – with or without a deal, to achieve total victory.”
A truce agreement would delay the Rafah operation by at least a month but if there is no deal it is expected that Israel will push ahead with its military offensive, beginning with the forced evacuation of the more than a million war refugees who fled to Rafah after Israel began its assault on Gaza in October.
During a meeting with Mr Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Tuesday, France’s foreign minister, Stéphane Séjourné, said an Israeli offensive in Rafah was a bad idea and would not resolve anything in the country’s fight against Hamas.
Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the Unrwa Palestinian refugee agency, said the threat of imminent invasion was causing people in Rafah to live in a state of constant trauma.
“People have not yet been asked to evacuate from Rafah, but there is a sense that if there is no deal this week that could happen,” he said. “My colleagues on the ground are describing a constant state of trauma among the people.”
The leaders of the two far-right parties in Mr Netanyahu’s government have both issued ultimatums warning him against cancelling the Rafah operation.
“If the order to conquer Rafah is cancelled, a government under your leadership will have no right to exist,” said finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, head of the Religious Zionist Party.
Under the first stage of the Egyptian framework, involving a “humanitarian pause” in the fighting, Hamas would release women, elderly and sick hostages taken in its attack on Israel on October 7th in return for Palestinian militants. But whereas Hamas claims it has only about 20 hostages who fit this category, Israel insists there are 33.
During this stage, the talks mediators hope the sides would be able to reach an agreement on ending the war and the release of the remaining hostages, despite Mr Netanyahu’s bellicose statements about Rafah.
Israel made a significant concession, agreeing that residents who fled from Gaza City and other areas in northern Gaza would be allowed to return to their homes. According to media reports the returnees would be inspected by Egypt, with Israel monitoring them by “other means”, to allay fears that Hamas militants would return to the north, potentially bringing hostages with them.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken, who described Israel’s truce offer as “extremely generous”,” will hold talks in Israel on Wednesday following discussions in Riyadh on plans for normalisation between Israel and Saudi Arabia as part of a wider postwar regional vision, including steps towards Palestinian statehood.
