Amid pending Rafah offensive, Hamas accepts ceasefire terms

Cairo: Amidst an ongoing Israeli military assault on Rafah, Hamas declared on Monday that it has agreed to the terms of a ceasefire agreement in Gaza. However, no specifics had been disclosed, and Israel's response was also expected given concerns expressed by its officials, according to sources.

In a statement published on its official website, Hamas said it has informed Qatari and Egyptian mediators of its decision, the BBC reported.

It said its leader, Ismail Haniyeh, conducted a telephone call with Qatar's Prime Minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, and Egyptian Intelligence Minister Abbas Kamel, and informed them of Hamas's approval of their proposal regarding a ceasefire agreement.

Hamas said that now it was up to Israel to respond.

Details of the ceasefire deal, especially its duration and the fate of Israeli captives in Gaza are still to be known.

There were also reports that Israel was not fully on board with the ceasefire deal as hammered out, but no reaction had come from it yet.

Israel's Channel 12 quoted Israeli officials as saying that their negotiating team has just received Hamas’s response from the mediators, and is now carefully evaluating it and will issue comments later this evening.

It also quoted the officials as saying that "this is not the same proposal" for a deal that Israel and Egypt agreed upon 10 days ago, and that served as the basis for the indirect negotiations since then, as "all kinds of clauses" have been inserted.

The developments came soon after US President Joe Biden reiterated "his clear position on Rafah" during a phone call with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that it will not support an invasion of Rafah without a plan to help the civilians sheltering there.

On Sunday, Netanyahu, as negotiations resumed in Egypt to strike a deal for a pause in Israel's Gaza offensive in return for the release of hostages taken by Hamas, asserted that his country will not accept Hamas's demands to end the Gaza war.

"We are not ready to accept a situation in which the Hamas battalions come out of their bunkers, take control of Gaza again, rebuild their military infrastructure, and return to threatening the citizens of Israel in the surrounding communities, in the cities of the south, in all parts of the country," he had said.

With inputs from IANS