Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza
Hamas's unconditional release of US-Israeli citizen Edan Alexander this month had raised hopes that a Gaza ceasefire deal was within reach. Nearly two weeks later, that optimism has all but evaporated.
In place of hope is the derailment of the latest round of Gaza ceasefire negotiations, as Israel presses on with a major military offensive that is killing scores of Palestinians daily, while the prospect of death from hunger hangs over many of the territory's 2.3 million residents.
Hamas released Mr Alexander, who was serving in the Israeli military when he was captured, as a goodwill gesture to US President Donald Trump as he embarked on a regional tour that took him to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE last week. The idea was that this would prompt the Trump administration to pressure Israel into agreeing to a ceasefire deal.
It never happened.
A Hamas official based in Beirut said on Thursday the latest round of ceasefire talks in Qatar had collapsed and blamed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for sabotaging them.
“As always, every time the atmosphere becomes positive and we get close to a deal, Netanyahu appears to sabotage the talks and block the path to an agreement for his own personal interests,” he said.
Israeli media, meanwhile, reported that Mr Netanyahu's government had recalled its negotiators from the talks in Qatar's capital, Doha.
Sources told The National that Israel's three-man delegation appeared to have had no mandate to negotiate and spent more time in their hotel rooms than at the negotiating table or with the mediators from the US, Egypt and Qatar.
"The whole process appeared to gradually lose steam soon after Edan Alexander was freed," said one of the sources. "The Hamas negotiators felt cheated and betrayed, and the Egyptian and Qatari mediators were deeply frustrated by the lack of progress after the initial burst of optimism.
"It is almost like they [the Israelis] went to Doha to stymie the process," the source added.
In the run-up to Mr Alexander's release on May 12, US mediators held direct talks with Hamas officials in Doha and everyone involved, including the mediators, became more hopeful than they had been in months that a deal could be clinched.
But the sources said Hamas, dejected by the lack of a US reward for Mr Alexander's release, had rejected the latest truce proposal.
The proposal echoed ideas first suggested by US envoy Steve Witkoff and embraced by Israel, they said. It provided for a six-week truce, the resumption of aid deliveries to Gaza and the release of 10 hostages along with the remains of half of those who died in captivity.
The plan offered no guarantees for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza or a permanent ceasefire, which are core to Hamas's demand for a comprehensive deal under which it will release all 58 hostages – of whom only 20 are believed to be alive – in return for a truce of five to 10 years and the freedom of hundreds of Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
Hamas has in recent months also signalled its willingness to forgo any role in the postwar government and reconstruction of Gaza, and to transform itself into a political party. It has also suggested it is prepared to lay down, but not surrender, its arms and for some of its leaders to leave Gaza to live in exile.
As the Doha talks collapsed, Israel kept up its relentless bombardment of Gaza, where the entire population is deemed to be at risk of famine. It also declared its intention to bring the entire strip under the control of its military.
Israel is now under mounting pressure, including from traditional allies, to halt its expanded offensive and allow aid into the territory. Foreign ministers of the EU agreed on Tuesday to review the bloc's co-operation accord with Israel, which includes trade.
Egypt, whose relations with Israel have been fraught since the Gaza war broke out 19 months ago, said on Thursday it welcomed the "marked change" in the position of international parties that now reject Israel's "disgraceful violations" in Gaza.
"Egypt views these changes as a reflection of a correct course and deserved support from the international community for the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people," said a Foreign Ministry statement.
Bound by a 1979 peace treaty with Israel, Egypt has been enraged by its neighbour's conduct in Gaza, where more than 53,700 Palestinians have been killed since the war began. It is now routinely issuing strongly worded condemnations of Israel's actions in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
The level of Cairo's criticism increased dramatically after Israel's military seized the Palestinian side of the Gaza-Egypt border last May, including the Rafah crossing, the only exit and entry point of the enclave not controlled by Israel.
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Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
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