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Blinken in Qatar to hear Hamas response on proposed ceasefire
[US Secretary of State] Antony Blinken is most likely looking forward to hearing what Hamas will say about the last offer that was presented to them about 10 days ago, particularly after the Qataris, Egyptians, the CIA and Mossad chiefs met in Paris.
[The offer] is based on the idea of a phased deal, starting with a pause [in fighting] of about four weeks in exchange for the release of Israeli captives – particularly the women and elderly – which is going to be followed by another phase.
The problem in the past was basically Hamas saying ‘No, we want a ceasefire outright and then we will talk about the other details of the agreement particularly when it comes to exchanging the captives for a number of Palestinians detained by Israel’. They believe they have now managed to narrow the differences between the Israelis, and this is why we are looking forward to seeing what Hamas will say, whether it will give the go-ahead for this agreement.
Last time Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani was in the US, he said the feeling in this particular moment was that they were in a very comfortable position to bring the Israelis and Hamas to agree on a deal, and that he was confident this time they’re not going to be talking about a truce like what happened in November but about a ceasefire. But still, we are going to wait to see what Hamas is going to say.
Censorship war ongoing as well
Herzog meets with TikTok officials as Israel accuses platform of pro-Palestine stance
A readout from the Israeli president’s office says that Herzog met with senior officials from Chinese-owned social media giant TikTok in Jerusalem to discuss “the increase of cases of antisemitism” and “anti-Israel hatred”. The meeting comes after months of accusations by both Israel and US lawmakers that TikTok is allowing pro-Palestine and anti-Semitic videos, rallying young people against Israel and Jewish people.
In December 2023, social media giant Meta was found to have systematically censored pro-Palestine voices during the Gaza war, according to a report by Human Rights Watch. The report says that Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, has pulled down or suppressed hundreds of pro-Palestine posts due to flawed content moderation policies, poor implementation, and “undue government influence”.
Milei says he plans to move Argentina’s embassy to Jerusalem
Argentina’s newly elected President Javier Milei has controversially declared he planned to relocate his country’s embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, as he arrived for a visit in Israel. “My plan is to move the embassy to West Jerusalem,” he told Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz on the tarmac of the airport near Tel Aviv.
Jerusalem remains at the heart of the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with Palestinian leaders insisting that East Jerusalem – illegally occupied by Israel since 1967 – should serve as the capital of a Palestinian state. Most countries have their diplomatic posts in Tel Aviv, but the United States in 2018 controversially relocated its embassy to Jerusalem under former President Donald Trump, breaking with decades of US policy by recognising it as Israel’s capital.
Hamas hits out at Argentina’s decision to move embassy to Jerusalem
The Palestinian group said that the move constituted “an infringement of the rights of our Palestinian people to their land, and a violation of the rules of international law, considering Jerusalem as occupied Palestinian land”.
