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Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu: "If we agreed to this, our soldiers would have died in vain."

Photo: Ronen Zvulun / EPA

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu officially does not want to know about an end to the fight against Hamas in the Gaza Strip - only on Sunday he refused to respond to the terrorist organization's maximum demands.

In the background, however, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal, pressure is growing on Israel and Hamas to contain the conflict through a gradual diplomatic process.

Accordingly, the USA, Egypt and Qatar are pushing for such an approach.

The USA is Israel's most important ally; Qatar has already mediated in the past.

According to the report, the process should start with the release of hostages, later the Israeli troops should leave the Gaza Strip and the war should end.

The newspaper refers to unnamed diplomats who are said to have been involved in the mediation attempts.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the talks are currently still in an early phase.

A Hamas media advisor said there had been no real progress so far.

EU foreign ministers want to discuss on Monday

US President Joe Biden's Middle East coordinator Brett McGurk is expected to attend talks in Egypt and Qatar this week, according to US media reports.

McGurk is expected to meet Qatar's Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani.

The foreign ministers of the EU states also want to discuss with colleagues from the Middle East on Monday about possible initiatives for a lasting settlement of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

Protest against Netanyahu

In Israel, pressure is growing on Prime Minister Netanyahu to free the hostages still held captive in the Gaza Strip.

As the newspaper "The Times of Israel" reported on Monday night, relatives of the more than 130 hostages pitched tents on a sidewalk in front of Netanyahu's private home in Jerusalem.

A spokesman was quoted as saying that they would remain in the tents until Netanyahu "agreed to an agreement to return the hostages."

Netanyahu rejected Hamas' conditions on Sunday.

The Islamists are demanding an end to the war, the withdrawal of the Israeli armed forces and the continued government power of Hamas in the Gaza Strip in order to release the more than 130 hostages, Netanyahu said.

Hamas is also calling for the release of the "murderers and rapists" whom Israel arrested after the brutal attack by Hamas and other extremist groups on October 7th.

"If we agreed to this, our soldiers would have died in vain," said Netanyahu.

Then we would “not be able to guarantee the safety of our citizens.”

There was already a ceasefire in the conflict last November.

As a result, 105 hostages were released in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners.

After that, the conflict continued with the same severity.

Netanyahu said on Sunday that he was working “around the clock” to free the hostages.

"But so that it is clear: I reject the surrender terms of the Hamas monsters in the most decisive way." The war in Gaza will continue "until complete victory, until we have achieved all of our goals."

BBC: Israel still far from defeating Hamas

However, Israel's military progress against the terrorist organization is difficult to assess because Hamas has retreated into a huge network of tunnels under the Gaza Strip.

The British broadcaster BBC reported on Monday night, citing US intelligence services, that the Israeli military may have killed 20 to 30 percent of Hamas fighters in Gaza so far.

This means that the army is far from Netanyahu's declared goal of "completely destroying" Hamas.

Accordingly, Hamas still has enough ammunition to attack Israel and its armed forces for months.

In addition, not a single senior Hamas commander has been captured or killed in Gaza so far.

Terrorists from Hamas and other extremist organizations killed around 1,200 people and kidnapped around 250 hostages in the attack against Israel on October 7th.

Israel responded with air strikes and a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip, in which, according to Palestinian information, around 25,000 people have so far fallen victim.

The information cannot be independently verified.

fek/dpa