Gaza Strip
\nQatar is suspending its role as a mediator in talks between Israel and Hamas after concluding that the two sides are no longer negotiating in good faith, its foreign ministry said Saturday.
\nQatar, which has hosted Hamas\u2019 political office in Doha since 2012, has alongside Egypt served as an intermediary for the two sides, which do not officially maintain direct contact.
\nA diplomatic source briefed on the matter told CNN that the Qatari government made the decision after concluding that both sides are now refusing \u201cto engage constructively.\u201d
\n\u201cThe State of Qatar notified the parties 10 days ago during the last attempts to reach an agreement, that it would stall its efforts to mediate between Hamas and Israel if an agreement was not reached in that round,\u201d Majed Al-Ansari, the spokesperson for the Qatari Foreign Ministry, said in a statement Saturday.
\nExcept for a brief flurry of activity last month, there have been no real negotiations since six Israeli hostages were executed by Hamas and discovered in a Gaza tunnel at the end of August. During a temporary ceasefire mediated by Qatar and Egypt last November, Hamas released 105 hostages and Israel released 240 Palestinian prisoners.
\n\u201cThe Qataris have concluded that there is insufficient willingness from either side, with the mediation efforts becoming more about politics and PR rather than a serious attempt to secure peace, save the hostages and Palestinian civilians,\u201d the diplomatic source told CNN. \u201cAs a consequence, the Hamas political office no longer serves its purpose.\u201d
\nA separate diplomatic source told CNN that Hamas\u2019 political office in Doha \u201c\u2060won\u2019t be operational so (Hamas) may leave. The office could open again if talks restart.\u201d
\nHamas has insisted that any agreement with Israel must lead to a permanent end to the war in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused that demand. In July he effectively spiked a draft hostage and ceasefire deal by introducing a raft of new, 11th-hour demands.
\nThere are 101 hostages still held in Gaza. Israel\u2019s military campaign, launched in response to Hamas\u2019 October 7 attack, has killed more than 43,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health; the UN reported that 70% of the fatalities in the first six months of the conflict were women and children.
\nThe Israeli minister of economy, Nir Barkat, appeared to offer the first official Israeli reaction to the move, saying on X that \u201cQatar was never a mediator, but Hamas\u2019 defender, the one to fund and protect the terrorist organization.\u201d Netanyahu for years backed payments to Hamas through Qatar, in order to divide Palestinian politics and \u2013 detractors allege \u2013 prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.
\nIt is not the first time the Qatari government has expressed frustration \u2013 particularly with insinuations that it was too close to Hamas. In April, Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said that Qatar\u2019s efforts were being misused for \u201cnarrow political interests\u201d by some involved in the conflict, \u201cwhich required the state of Qatar to conduct a comprehensive evaluation\u201d of its role.
\nThe Qatari government has now told the Biden administration that it is willing to restart its mediation efforts \u201cwhen both sides reach an impasse and demonstrate a sincere willingness to return to the negotiating table with the objective of putting an end to the war and the suffering of civilians.\u201d
\nA senior American official told CNN that while Qatar had played \u201can invaluable role in helping to mediate a hostage deal\u201d last year, \u201cfollowing Hamas\u2019 repeated refusal to release even a small number of hostages, including most recently during meetings in Cairo, their continued presence in Doha is no longer viable or acceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gaza Strip Qatar is suspending its role as a mediator in talks between Israel and Hamas after concluding that the two sides are no longer negotiating in good faith, its foreign ministry said Saturday. Qatar, which has hosted Hamas\u2019 political office in Doha since 2012, has alongside Egypt served as an intermediary for the two …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":72918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72934"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72945,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72934\/revisions\/72945"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}