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Israel has offered Hamas a two-month ceasefire as part of a possible hostage deal, Axios reported Monday, citing two unnamed Israeli officials.
It would be “the longest ceasefire Israel has offered to Hamas since the war began,” wrote Axios reporter Barak Ravid, who is also a CNN analyst.
The proposal comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected Hamas's demand for an end to the Gaza war in return for the release of hostages held there, as he faces increasing public pressure to bring the prisoners home.
To release the remaining hostages, Hamas demanded an end to the war, the release of Palestinian prisoners and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, according to Netanyahu. “I'm working on it around the clock. But to be clear: I strongly reject the conditions for the surrender of the Hamas monsters,” he said in a statement on Sunday, adding that agreeing to the conditions violated Israel's security.
“If we agree to this, our soldiers will have fallen in vain. If we agree to this, we cannot guarantee the safety of our citizens,” the Prime Minister said.
Since then, Netanyahu has told the families of the remaining Israeli hostages in Gaza that Israel has an “initiative” to secure the release of those abducted – but there is “no real proposal” from Hamas that would advance their freedom, according to the prime minister's office .
According to the Axios report, Israel's latest proposal calls for the release of all remaining hostages and hostage bodies in phases in exchange for Palestinian detainees held in Israel.
Israel would also move its forces out of major population centers and allow “a gradual return of Palestinian civilians to Gaza City and the northern Gaza Strip.”
Israel believes that of the 253 hostages seized by Hamas on October 7, they are still in Gaza, 104 of whom are believed to be alive.
Ohad Zwigenberg/AP
Relatives and supporters of Israeli hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip take part in a protest outside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's residence in Jerusalem on Sunday, demanding their release.
According to the Wall Street Journal report, the US, Egypt and Qatar want Israel to enter a new phase of talks with Hamas that would begin with the release of hostages and lead to the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
These developments come amid growing divisions within Israel's war cabinet over whether to prioritize repatriating hostages over defeating Hamas, and with thousands protesting in Tel Aviv over the weekend against Netanyahu's conduct of the war.
War Cabinet Minister Gadi Eisenkot suggested last week that the main war goal of defeating Hamas was unrealistic and called for new elections within months. Eisenkot also said the government had failed to achieve what he said was its top priority: securing the release of the hostages.
Netanyahu is under increasing pressure from the Israeli public to secure the release of prisoners in Gaza. On Monday, more than a dozen people, including family members of the hostages, broke into a meeting of the Israeli parliament's finance committee. The demonstrators held placards that read: “You will not sit here while they die there.”
A video of the scene showed security officers trying to remove the demonstrators amid shouting and jostling.
“It can not go on like this. You should know better. It can not go on like this. “You will not sit here while our children die there,” one protester shouted. There were no reports of arrests within the parliament, known as the Knesset.
Israeli police said that at a separate demonstration, dozens of protesters blocked the entrance to the Knesset, “violating public order.” This protest called for an immediate election and included some families of those killed on October 7th.
After some refused to leave, a police officer issued an eviction order, an Israeli police statement said.
A poll released Monday by CNN's Israeli affiliate Channel 13 found that 35% of Israelis would support a deal that would release all Gaza hostages in exchange for ending the war and releasing all Hamas prisoners in Israel. Almost half (46%) said they would reject such a deal.
A slim majority (53%) said Netanyahu's personal interests were the main reason he went to war, and a third (33%) said the national interest was his main reason.
It has been more than three months since Israel began its war against Hamas, which Israeli authorities said was in response to the group's brutal attack on October 7 that killed 1,200 people.
Meanwhile, the death toll in Gaza exceeded 25,000 on Sunday, the Hamas-controlled health ministry in the enclave said.
CNN cannot independently verify the numbers.
Leo Correa/AP
Israeli soldiers move on armored personnel carriers near the Israel-Gaza border as smoke rises into the sky in Gaza, seen from southern Israel on Sunday.
Netanyahu reiterated his opposition to future Palestinian sovereignty over the occupied territories on Saturday after talks with US President Joe Biden about the future of Gaza. The White House is urging Israel to recognize the need for Palestinians to establish an independent state in areas Israel captured in the 1967 war.
“I will not compromise on full Israeli security control over the entire area west of Jordan – and that is inconsistent with a Palestinian state,” Netanyahu said in a post on X on Saturday.
The prime minister's public rejection of a Palestinian state puts him at odds with Israel's staunchest ally, which has long advocated for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Several European foreign ministers also joined Netanyahu in criticizing Israel's resistance to a two-state solution. Josep Borrell, the European Union's foreign policy chief, said on Monday that Israel's opposition to a two-state solution was “unacceptable” and that Israel could not expect countries to abandon the issue.
This story has been updated.