U.S. President Joe Biden affirms ongoing efforts with Qatar, Egypt, and Israel to secure the release of captives held by Hamas in Gaza.
U.S. President Joe Biden said he was “maintaining close contact” with Qatar, Egypt, and Israel to return the remaining hostages from Hamas in Gaza on Sunday during the 100-day mark of the beginning of the genocidal war on the Strip.
“The United States and our partners have not given up […] I look forward to maintaining close contact with my counterparts in Qatar, Egypt, and Israel to return all hostages home and back to their families,” Biden said on what the White House named the “100 Days of Captivity for Hostages in Gaza”.
The statement came on the 100th day of Israel’s onslaught in Gaza where Israel killed at least 24,000 Palestinians while wounding 60,317 others. The war has reduced the once vibrant coastal enclave to rubble, displacing more than two million Palestinians.
Israel and its Western allies, at the top of which the U.S., have long cited Hamas’s surprise attack of October 7 as the reason behind the genocide in Gaza.
The operation saw the Al-Qassam Brigades – Hamas’ armed wing – infiltrate the occupied territories through air, land and sea while returning to Gaza with at least 240 captives.
Al-Qassam said at the time that the operation was in response to the increased raids of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and settler violence towards Palestinians living under nearly 76 years of occupation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu then vowed to turn Gaza “into rubble” hours after the operation and has since rejected global calls for a ceasefire.
Tel Aviv and Washington believe a ceasefire would disrupt its attempts to eliminate Hamas, a goal that analysts have widely described as unrealistic. More than 70% of the victims in Gaza are women and children.
The U.S. had immediately approached Qatar for assistance in securing the release of the captives from Hamas within the first moments of the October 7 operation.
The mediation of Qatar—the host of a Hamas political bureau—and Egypt resulted in a temporary truce between November 24 and December 1. The pause saw the release of at least 110 Israeli and foreign captives from Gaza as well as 240 Palestinian women and children from Israeli prisons.
Qatar, also a major non-NATO ally, had reached another agreement with Israel on January 12 to allow the delivery of medicines to the remaining 120 captives.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in Qatar on January 7 as part of a regional tour in a scramble for another captive release deal.
“Qatar was instrumental in the negotiations that led to the simultaneous release of more than 100 hostages, including American citizens, and a pause in the fighting that during that time enabled us to double the flow of humanitarian aid to civilians in Gaza,” Blinken told the press in Doha at the time.
Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war on Gaza despite domestic pressure to ensure the return of the remaining captives. Hamas had said on Sunday that it lost contact with some captives due to the non-stop Israeli bombardment of Gaza.
On Sunday, Netanyahu vowed to continue the war until achieving “total victory” during a press conference, as Tel Aviv’s war cabinet remains split over the military campaign in Gaza.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog was also booed at an event in Tel Aviv on the same day, with the audience screaming “Now! Now!”
“I call upon the entire family of nations to do your part. This isn’t just our battle. It is a battle for the entire world. Stand with life and liberty. Stand with freedom and democracy, against barbarism and hate,” he said.
Hamas also aired a video of three Israeli captives in Gaza with a message saying: “Tomorrow [Monday] we will inform you of their fate.”
