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Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday accused Hamas of reneging on parts of the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, as he faced a pushback against the US-brokered agreement from his far-right allies.
Hamas said that it remained committed to the deal announced by mediators on Wednesday.
US President Joe Biden, president-elect Donald Trump and the prime minister of Qatar, whose countries have been mediating the talks, announced on Wednesday night that Hamas and Israel had reached agreement on a deal that would halt the 15-month war in Gaza and free the 98 hostages still in captivity.
Trump, who was the first leader to hail the deal on Wednesday, has put pressure on both Israel and Hamas to agree a deal before his inauguration on Monday.
He has repeatedly warned that there will be “all hell to pay” if the hostages are not released by January 20. The ceasefire is supposed to come into effect and the first hostages released on Sunday.
But Netanyahu’s government, which relies on the support of two far-right parties bitterly opposed to any deal, said final details remained to be sorted out, and on Thursday morning added that Hamas was backtracking.
“Israel will not set a date for a cabinet and government meeting [to approve the deal] until the mediators announce that Hamas has approved all the details of the agreement,” Netanyahu’s office said.
Netanyahu’s statement came as a member of finance minister Bezalel Smotrich’s far-right Religious Zionist party said on Thursday morning that it could leave the government if it approved a deal.
Speaking to Kan Radio, Zvi Sukkot, a lawmaker from the party, said it would “in all likelihood” resign from the government if a deal was approved, since its mission was to “change the DNA of Israel”, not just make up numbers in the coalition.
Smotrich himself has repeatedly criticised the deal, and on Wednesday night branded it “bad and dangerous”. He said his condition for remaining in the government was that Israel should be able to resume the war in Gaza “at full force” once the hostages had been freed.
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