US hopeful for Gaza ceasefire despite negotiation deadlock

Ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas entered a deadlock, amid over 20 people reported killed in continued violence on the ground. But despite the negotiations stalling, US President Donald Trump expressed hope for a breakthrough, according to Al-Monitor via AFP. 

The indirect talks in Doha, Qatar, stalled over July 12th and 13th, with each side accusing the other of obstructing a proposed 60-day ceasefire and the release of hostages.

In Gaza, civil defence officials reported at least 22 fatalities from Israeli airstrikes in Gaza City and Khan Younis on July 14th. One strike on a tent in Khan Younis killed the parents and three brothers of a young boy, who survived because he was outside fetching water, according to his uncle, Belal al-Adlouni. Belal al-Adlouni told AFP that the bloodshed “will not be forgotten and will not die with the passage of time, nor with displacement or with death.”

From July 12th to 13th, AFP reporters in southern Israel observed heavy smoke rising from northern Gaza, where Israeli forces said they had carried out airstrikes targeting Hamas positions.

“Gaza — we are talking and hopefully we’re going to get that straightened out over the next week,” Trump told reporters late on July 13th, echoing similarly optimistic remarks he made on July 4th.

A Palestinian source with knowledge of the negotiations told AFP on July 12th that Hamas had rejected Israeli proposals to maintain troops in over 40% of Gaza and to relocate Palestinians to an enclave near the Egyptian border.

In response, a senior Israeli political official claimed Hamas has been inflexible and has deliberately attempted to derail the talks by “clinging to positions that prevent the mediators from advancing an agreement.”

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar and Palestinian Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin travelled to Brussels on July 14th to attend discussions between the EU and its Mediterranean partners.

However, the Palestinian Authority, based in Ramallah, denied media reports suggesting that a meeting between the two ministers was planned.

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that he would consider entering talks for a longer-term ceasefire only after a temporary truce is secured and “only when Hamas lays down its weapons.”

However, Netanyahu is facing increasing pressure to bring the war to a close, as military casualties rise and public frustration grows over the continued captivity of hostages and the perceived lack of progress in the conflict.

While his fragile governing coalition remains intact for now, Netanyahu is widely viewed as reliant on a small group of far-right ministers who are pushing to prolong a war that is becoming increasingly unpopular.

He is also under fire for backing a controversial plan to construct a so-called “humanitarian city” in southern Gaza to house displaced Palestinians if and when a ceasefire is reached.

This plan was proposed by Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz on July 8th. It aims to relocate around 600,000 Palestinians to a tightly controlled zone in Al-Mawasi, marketed as a “closed humanitarian city”—a plan widely condemned as an attempt at forced displacement and likened to an open-air concentration camp. Under the plan, civilian administration would be led by international aid groups while Israel would be in full military control.

According to Israeli media, the financial implications of the plan were discussed during a security cabinet meeting at the prime minister’s office on the evening of July 13th, just hours ahead of Netanyahu’s latest court appearance in his ongoing corruption trial on July 14th.

Al-Monitor via AFP, Maghrebi.org