Humanitarian issues are the sticking point in the talks for a hostage deal which have not been promising in the last days, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Thani told the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
“We still see some difficulties on the humanitarian part of these negotiations,” Thani said.
He described how the talks which his country and Egypt have been mediating had been progressing but then hit a snag in the last days.
“We made some good progress in the last few weeks in the negotiations,” Thani said, but in the last days, the situation has “not been promising.”.
The several elements of the agreement
He warned that “time is not in our favor” particularly in light of the upcoming Muslim holiday month of Ramadan which is “ahead of us,” combined with the potential of an Israeli army military operation in Gaza’s Rafah.
The agreement has two elements, he said, the humanitarian one and the issue of how many captives would be freed.
“We believe that if we can reach an agreement on the humanitarian side of the agreement I do not think, the numbers will remain an obstacle,
“If we are able to reach in the next few days some good conditions” on the humanitarian issue, “I believe that we can see a deal happening very soon.”
“If we are able to reach an agreement on the humanitarian side of the agreement I do not think, the numbers will remain an obstacle,” he said.
Thani spoke in the aftermath of an accelerated push by CIA Director William Burns to secure the release of the remaining 134 captives held in Gaza.
Israel had initially sent a delegation to talks he held in Cairo but then held off from letting a second delegation travel there, explaining that Hamas had not put anything new on the table.
Among the sticking points has been Hamas’s demand for a permanent ceasefire, while Israel has insisted that a deal would pause a war that could only be ended with the destruction of Hamas.
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