TUNIS, March 2. /TASS/. Hamas will not agree to extend the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal with Israel, the movement’s senior official Mahmoud Mardawi said.
"We will not agree to extend the first stage and insist on the phased implementation of the deal as it was signed," he told the Al Jazeera television channel. He stressed that the terms of the deal with Israel "cannot be revised" and called on the mediators to "compel the occupational authorities to implement the agreement." Israel "will receive its hostages only via a swap deal," he added.
Earlier in the day, the Al Araby Al Jadeed newspaper reported, citing an Egyptian source, that Egyptian mediators have proposed that the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas be extended for two weeks to begin talks on the second phase. Cairo’s plan envisages that during this two-week period "Hamas will undertake to hand over two groups of Israeli hostages," each including one living person and two bodies.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in the small hours on Sunday that Israel accepts US Presidential Special Envoy Steve Witkoff’s temporary ceasefire plan during Ramadan (until March 29) and Passover (from April 12 through 19). Under the plan, Palestinian groups are to release half of the hostages and hand over the bodies of those dead on the first day and release the remaining hostages, living and dead, at the end, if an agreement is reached on a permanent ceasefire.
According to Israeli prime minister’s representatives, should Hamas accept the US plan, Israel "will immediately begin talks on the details of Witkoff’s plan." However, later in the day, Netanyahu’s office said that Hamas had rejected the US proposal and Israel was blocking humanitarian deliveries to the Gaza Strip and closing all checkpoints along the enclave’s border.
In mid-January, Israel and Hamas reached an Egypt-, Qatar-, and US-brokered three-stage agreement to release the hostages held in Gaza and declare a ceasefire in the enclave. The three-phase deal took effect on January 19. The initial 42-day phase of the ceasefire ended on March 1.