U.S. President Joe Biden accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday of not doing enough to secure a ceasefire-for-hostages-and-terrorists-release deal with Hamas, two weeks after Jerusalem accepted the latest proposals put forward by Washington.
Asked by reporters outside the White House whether Netanyahu was doing enough, Biden said, “No.”
A senior official in the Prime Minister’s Office told reporters, “It is puzzling that President Biden is pressing Prime Minister Netanyahu, who agreed to the U.S. proposal as early as May 31 and to the U.S. bridging proposal on Aug. 16, and not Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who continues to vehemently refuse any deal.
“The words of the U.S. president are especially dangerous when they come just days after Hamas executed six Israeli hostages, including an American citizen,” the official added.
On Saturday, Israeli forces retrieved the bodies of six hostages from Gaza. According to forensic findings, the captives were murdered 48 to 72 hours before the autopsies, which would place their deaths between Thursday and Friday morning.
The hostages were shot at short range, suggesting that their Hamas captors executed them, the L. Greenberg National Institute of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv’s Abu Kabir neighborhood said.
Hamas released video footage on Monday showing the six hostages and threatened to release their “last messages” before they were executed. JNS has decided not to publish the propaganda video on its website.
On Sunday, Netanyahu said in a recorded video statement that he was “outraged to the depths” of his soul by the murder of the hostages and blamed Hamas for continuing to block a ceasefire agreement.
“Whoever murders hostages—does not want a deal. For our part, we will not relent. The government of Israel is committed, and I am personally committed, to continue striving towards a deal that will return all of our hostages and ensure our security and our existence,” the premier said.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has confirmed that Jerusalem accepted Biden’s May 31 ceasefire-for-hostages outline, as well as last month’s so-called “bridging proposal” presented by the United States.
“In a very constructive meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu today, he confirmed to me that Israel accepts the bridging proposal, that he supports it,” the diplomat told reporters after meetings in Jerusalem on Aug. 19, adding that “it’s now incumbent on Hamas to do the same.”
Hamas formally rejected the bridging proposal on Aug. 18, accusing Netanyahu of “setting new conditions and demands with the aim of thwarting the mediators’ efforts and prolonging the war.
“The new proposal responds to Netanyahu’s conditions, especially with regards to his refusal to stop the war and fully withdraw from Gaza,” it said in the statement. “We hold Netanyahu fully responsible for blocking an agreement and fully responsible for the lives of his prisoners,” Hamas said, referring to the hostages it holds after more than 300 days.
The terrorist organization again stressed it would only agree to a deal that includes an end to the war and a withdrawal of all Israel Defense Forces soldiers from Gaza, as it outlined in its July 2 response to mediators.
After IDF soldiers recovered the remains of U.S. dual citizen Hersh Goldberg-Polin and five other hostages from Gaza on Saturday, Biden said he was “devastated and outraged.” He vowed that “Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes,” but then said that the U.S. “will keep working around the clock” to secure a deal—which would be between the Jewish state and Hamas—to release the remaining 101 hostages.
Former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for the White House, on Sunday blamed the hostages’ deaths on “a complete lack of American strength and leadership.
“This happened because Comrade Kamala Harris and Crooked Joe Biden are poor leaders. Americans are getting slaughtered overseas, while Kamala is disparaging and making up lies about gold star families, and Biden is sleeping on the beach on this 16th consecutive day of vacation,” Trump added in a post on his Truth Social platform.