logo
US-Hamas talks complicate Gaza truce efforts: analysts

US-Hamas talks complicate Gaza truce efforts: analysts

Iraqi News07-03-2025

Doha – Unprecedented direct talks between the US and Hamas are a sign of dysfunction in fraught negotiations to prolong a truce in Gaza, analysts said Thursday.
Washington revealed it held talks with Hamas, which it designates as a 'terrorist' organisation, amid a standoff between Israel and the Palestinian militant group over how to proceed with the ceasefire, whose first phase expired last weekend.
The direct contact is 'a sign of a breakdown in mediation for a wider ceasefire', geopolitics expert Neil Quilliam said, calling the move 'symptomatic' of United States President Donald Trump's 'impatience with complex and timely negotiations'.
Israel 'must be concerned that his maverick approach to policy could undermine their immediate interests', Quilliam added.
'After all, the US president has already thrown a number of key allies under the bus,' said Quilliam, associate fellow at the Chatham House think-tank's Middle East and North Africa Programme.
James Dorsey, another Middle East specialist, said the direct talks would give Hamas 'a sense of having been legitimised strongly'.
The Israelis are in turn 'obviously worried' by the outreach, said Dorsey.
– 'Little confidence' –
'This complicates even more the ceasefire negotiations because Hamas is going to be stiffened in its insistence that the ceasefire agreement be adhered to, rather than an Israeli timetable,' Dorsey added.
The first, six-week phase of the Gaza truce, when Israeli hostages were exchanged for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, ended at the weekend.
Hamas has insisted on a transition to the second phase of the agreement, which should lead to a lasting ceasefire, while Israel moved away from terms of the January deal, calling for extending the first phase until mid-April.
Israel said it had been consulted by the United States and 'expressed its opinion'. US hostage envoy Adam Boehler's talks with Hamas took place in Doha in recent weeks.
The talks were first revealed by US media outlet Axios, which said Boehler and Hamas discussed US hostages held in Gaza as well as a longer-term truce.
The decision to meet Hamas 'clearly shows that the US have very little confidence in Israel and Israeli negotiators… to do what is necessary to get the hostages back,' said Andreas Krieg, a Middle East security specialist.
The King's College London academic said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had 'for the last 12, 13 months if not longer… tried to undermine mediation processes to get the hostages back'.
'And I think the US has now understood that,' he added.
– 'Separate avenue' –
Krieg said it could be useful for Qatari mediators, who brokered the ceasefire alongside the US and Egypt, 'to allow a sort of a separate avenue of negotiations happening where there isn't a party like the Netanyahu government that constantly disrupts, subverts and undermines'.
Quilliam said that while Qatar and Egypt 'might appear sidelined right now… the US, Israel and Hamas will continue to need them as current US and Israeli efforts will lead to more conflict and the two Arab states are the only interlocutors that step in and play a constructive role'.
Hours after Trump's administration revealed the Hamas talks, the president warned Gaza's population that 'you are DEAD' if the hostages are not released.
'He may have issued this social media posting simply, to some degree, to try and disillusion Hamas, dampen their expectations and calm Israeli fears,' Dorsey said.
'He's not declaring a policy. He's leaving everybody guessing,' said Dorsey, an honorary fellow at the National University of Singapore's Middle East Institute.
Krieg said the 'ultimatum that Trump put on the table is part of that entire context of mediation where he's using coercion, extremely transactionally, with a lot of pressure on Hamas'.
But he added: 'I think Trump wants to deflect from that revelation that they are directly talking to Hamas by him now saying, 'I'm strong, I'm going to get the hostages back… this is a way for me to justify why we're directly talking to Hamas.''

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Houthis launch two missiles toward Ben Gurion Airport
Houthis launch two missiles toward Ben Gurion Airport

Shafaq News

time2 hours ago

  • Shafaq News

Houthis launch two missiles toward Ben Gurion Airport

Shafaq News/ On Tuesday, Yemen's Ansarallah group (Houthis) fired two ballistic missiles targeting Ben Gurion Airport in central Israel. In a statement, the group's military spokesperson, Yahya Saree, confirmed the attack involved a 'Palestine-2' hypersonic and a 'Zulfiqar' missile. ''One of the projectiles reportedly struck the airport directly, with Israeli air defenses unable to intercept it. The statement added that flight operations at Ben Gurion remain suspended, urging all remaining airlines to halt services to and from the airport. This missile launch followed several hours after Israeli warplanes conducted airstrikes on a facility near Yemen's Red Sea port of Hodeidah, which Israel describes as a weapons transfer site. Despite ongoing Israeli strikes across Yemen, the Houthis have persisted in launching missiles and drones toward Israeli territory. The group frames its actions as support for Palestinians in Gaza, where more than 54,927 people have been killed and over 126,615 wounded—most of them women and children—according to health authorities in the Strip.

CENTCOM chief: US ready to strike Iran if Trump orders
CENTCOM chief: US ready to strike Iran if Trump orders

Shafaq News

time5 hours ago

  • Shafaq News

CENTCOM chief: US ready to strike Iran if Trump orders

Shafaq News/ On Tuesday, CENTCOM Commander General Michael Kurilla announced that the United States is prepared to respond with 'overwhelming force' to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, if ordered to do so by President Donald Trump. In an address to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Kurilla described the current moment as a 'strategic opportunity' to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed state, confirming that a broad set of plans had been presented to both the president and the secretary of defense to address the Iranian nuclear program. In his final testimony before leaving office, Kurilla labeled Iran's response to the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel as a turning point, accusing it of 'operationalized its entire proxy network and arsenal of standoff capabilities' to advance long-standing strategic aims. He noted that the network includes groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, which have suffered major setbacks in recent months. On Yemen, he considered the Houthis as a deeply entrenched force aligned with Tehran, responsible for more than 300 attacks targeting Israeli assets and international shipping lanes, adding that CENTCOM responded with targeted military operations that significantly degraded the group's capabilities, forcing the Houthis to halt maritime assaults.

Article In Qatari Government Daily: Muhammad Sinwar Was A Great And Daring Fighter – It Is Enough That He Was October 7 'Mastermind'
Article In Qatari Government Daily: Muhammad Sinwar Was A Great And Daring Fighter – It Is Enough That He Was October 7 'Mastermind'

Memri

time5 hours ago

  • Memri

Article In Qatari Government Daily: Muhammad Sinwar Was A Great And Daring Fighter – It Is Enough That He Was October 7 'Mastermind'

The Qatari government press continues to declare its full-throated support for Hamas and its terrorist activities against Israel, especially for its October 7, 2023 attack on Israel in which some 1,200 people were murdered and 251 were taken hostage. This approach is in line with Qatar's unconditional support for its protégé Hamas.[1] One expression of this support was an article published June 8, 2025 by the Qatari Al-Raya government daily. In it, senior writer Babiker Issa[2] praised Muhammad Sinwar, a top official of the Hamas military wing, the 'Izz Ad-​Din Al-Qassam Brigades, and one of the planners of the October 7 attack. Sinwar, killed recently in the Gaza Strip, was the brother of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was killed in October 2024. Under the headline "Sinwar – Icon of the Palestinian Resistance," Issa called Muhammad Sinwar "a daring fighter" and "an honorable and great warrior." He went on to describe him as "an icon of the national struggle on the land of Palestine and in Gaza," and as "the planner and the mastermind – with his comrades the fighters – of the Al-Aqsa Flood operation on October 7, 2023… which restored to the Palestinian issue its brilliance and its glory." Also in his article, Issa placed Muhammad Sinwar alongside prominent historical figures such as the Prophet Muhammad and Jesus Christ, freedom fighters such as Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela, and PLO leaders such as Yasser Arafat and his deputy Abu Jihad, who had headed the Fatah military wing and was responsible for the murder of dozens of Israelis in numerous terrorist attacks in the 1970s and 1980s. Muhammad Sinwar (Source: May 25, 2025) The following are excerpts from Babiker Issa's June 8, 2025 article in the Qatari Al-Raya government daily: Beginning his article with an extensive list of prominent figures who changed history, from Jesus and the Prophet Muhammad to the 20th century and "great and honorable fighters" such as Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, and others, Issa went on to state: "...What led me to the biographies of these esteemed fighters who sacrificed the best of their lives for the sake of their country is the story of the daring fighter Muhammad Sinwar (1975-2025), in whom I see, according to every criterion, an icon of the national struggle on the exalted land of Palestine and in Gaza of steadfastness. "It is enough that this great and honorable warrior was the planner and the mastermind – along with his comrades the fighters – of the Al-Aqsa Flood operation on October 7, 2023, which restored to the world the sanity that was absent and was stolen from it, and which restored to the Palestinian issue the brilliance and glory that was stolen from it. This was in spite of the excessive sacrifices [that resulted from the operation] and the attempts at exiling and erasing [the Palestinians] from human existence. "When I think of [Muhammad] Sinwar, who frightened his hangmen [i.e. the Israelis] even after his death, I think of a deceased leader: Yasser Arafat (1929-2004), a national symbol and a charismatic figure who combined diplomatic activity with the armed struggle, and of his fortunate comrades, several of whom I had the opportunity to meet. I recall George Habash (1926-2008), founder of the Popular Front [for the Liberation of Palestine], aka 'the doctor,' one of the most influential leaders in Palestinian revolutionary thought. [I recall] the fighter Khalil Al-Wazir (Abu Jihad, 1935-1988), architect of the first Intifada, who was killed by the Mossad in Tunisia. [I recall] the fighter Salah Khalaf Abu Iyad (1933-1991), one of the most prominent leaders of Fatah and head of internal security in the PLO..."[3]

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store