An Israeli military operation in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah could be “delayed somewhat” if a deal for a weeks-long truce between Israel and Hamas is reached, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday, February 25 but claimed that total victory in Gaza is “weeks away” once the military operation in Rafah begins.
Speaking to Margaret Brennan on CBS News’s “Face the Nation,” Netanyahu confirmed that a ceasefire deal is in the works but did not provide details.
Israeli media reported that mediators were making progress on an agreement for a temporary ceasefire and the release of dozens of hostages held captive in Gaza as well as Palestinian security prisoners held by Israel.
Reports say the deal includes the release in the first phase of some 40 hostages held in Gaza, including women, children, female soldiers and elderly and ill abductees, amid a pause in fighting of some six weeks.
It also includes the release by Israel of hundreds of Palestinian terror convicts, and a “redeployment” of Israeli troops within Gaza but not a complete withdrawal as Hamas had previously demanded.
The deal would also reportedly see Israel enable the return of Palestinian women and children to northern Gaza, from where hundreds of thousands evacuated during the fighting, and which Israel has kept cut off from the rest of the enclave.
Several Israeli media outlets, citing unnamed officials, said the war cabinet has approved the deal.
Talks resumed on Sunday in Qatar at the specialist level, Egypt’s state-run Al Qahera TV reported, citing an Egyptian official as saying further discussions would follow in Cairo with the aim of achieving the temporary ceasefire and release.
