The ceasefire in Gaza seems a matter of days, if Joe Biden’s words are heeded. The president of the United States assured that before Ramadan begins (March 10 to April 9) Israel will have temporarily ceased its military activities in the strip.
“Ramadan is approaching and the Israelis agreed that they would not participate in operations during this time, to give us time to remove all the hostages,” Biden said in an interview on the NBC channel. Earlier, while eating ice cream at an event in New York, he was even more precise in stating that the ceasefire would be announced early next week. “My national security adviser tells me we’re close,” Biden told reporters. “We’re not done yet. My hope is that next Monday we’ll have a ceasefire.”
According to Reuters, Hamas has received in Paris a draft proposal for the truce: it includes a 40-day pause in all military operations and the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages in a ratio of 10 to one. It would allow medical equipment in hospitals to be repaired and bakeries in Gaza to be renovated and 500 trucks of humanitarian aid to access the damaged enclave every day. It is the most serious attempt in weeks to end the conflict that broke out on October 7 after the attack by the Islamist group.
Biden believes that the temporary ceasefire would boost the process for the Palestinians to have their own stadium, a solution (that of two states), systematically rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Biden also warned that Israel risked losing international support due to the high death toll among Palestinians, adding that he had pledged to make it possible for Palestinians to be evacuated from Rafah in southern Gaza before intensifying his efforts there. campaign to destroy Hamas. “There are too many innocent people being killed. And Israel has slowed down the attacks in Rafah.”
According to Reuters sources, in the draft proposal the exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages would be done in a ratio of 10 to one. Hamas would release 40 Israeli hostages, including women, children under 19, the elderly over 50 and the sick, while Israel would release some 400 Palestinian prisoners and would not detain them again.
After Hamas killed 1,200 people and captured 253 hostages on October 7, the Israeli army’s ground attack on Gaza has already left almost 30,000 dead, according to Gaza health authorities.
