Blinken heads to Middle East to sell Gaza ceasefire deal

Mediators in the region – which also include Qatar – have been attempting to negotiate a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas for months.

Mr Netanyahu has vowed to resist any such deal until Hamas’s military and governing capabilities are destroyed and all hostages are released.

On Saturday, Israel’s forces, backed by air strikes, freed four more captives after fighting intense gun battles with Hamas in and around the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said the raid killed 274 people, including children and other civilians. Israel says fewer than 100 people died in the operation.

After the offensive, Hamas’s political leader said the group would not agree to a ceasefire deal unless it achieved security for Palestinians.

Mr Blinken is using his trip to argue that Hamas is the sole obstacle to the agreement of the ceasefire-for-hostage release deal that the US desperately seeks.

“Does Hamas want to end this conflict, end this war that it started, or not? We’ll find out,” he said.

“But it’s clear that virtually the entire world has come together in support of the proposal.”

The three-phase plan set out 10 days ago by Mr Biden would involve a six-week ceasefire that would become permanent, and the rebuilding of Gaza with international assistance.

The president called it Israel’s proposal, in an attempt to effectively bounce the two sides into progress.

The Biden administration claims the text is “nearly identical” to one endorsed by Hamas last month.

Hamas is likely to demand guarantees the plan would lead to a permanent ceasefire and full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Its political leadership in Doha has yet to formally respond to the proposal, according to US and Israeli officials, so it remains to be seen whether indirect negotiations can resume.

During its 7 October attacks in southern Israel, Hamas killed about 1,200 people and took some 251 people hostage.

Some 116 remain in the Palestinian territory, including 41 the army says are dead.

A deal agreed in November saw Hamas release 105 hostages in return for a week-long ceasefire and some 240 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

The Hamas-run health ministry says the death toll in Gaza has surpassed 37,000.