it’s never too late to close the door.
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Hamas doesn’t have 40 hostages who meet the set criteria (aged, women, sick, or underaged). It was mentioned when the previous round of negotiation broke down. Yes, Hamas could have potentially raised the stake (for Israel) by including hostages outside the criteria.
I don’t have any confidence that the negotiations will result in a ceasefire.
One of the things I have learnt is when anyone makes an extraordinary generous offer and they are applying pressure to decide very fast it’s usually a scam or has hidden strings attached.
Trust with Israel/US is at an all time low. It’s a poker game and what happens now will decide the future of the region for decades. Hamas will want a ceasefire but it can’t temporary, be under occupation, loss of land or other criteria I would think Israel would demand.
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A permanent ceasefire isn’t even in the conversation as long as those hostages are a factor. The 40 day time frame is one that outside parties hope will be long enough to build out additional elements of some kind of resolution. But there are absolutely elements in Israel only too happy to see Hamas reject a ceasefire.
I doubt Hamas even has all the hostages or bodies to give back.
In a decentralised network in a war zone, my guess is many of those are effectively casualties of the indiscriminate bombing.
The absurdity is hostages being a priority has simply been cover for real intentions. A lever rather than a driver.
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It was acknowledged early on that the fate of the hostages was not going to deter Israel from its genocidal intent.
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Just the fact that it’s a possibility makes me have hope for mankind. 
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No, that is my sense as well. It is a condition that cannot be met. I just don’t understand why Hamas doesn’t stop negotiating around them with some sort of statement to that effect, that they will return every one that they have, alive or dead.
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I’ve seen both the sides beat around the bush without actually coming down and talking.
Hamas has too many disparate elements with unclear leadership. That’s what often becomes the case with decentralised terrorist organisations. There might be elements in Hamas who would want a ceasefire , but there are elements which don’t.
I don’t think Israel wants a ceasefire. They’ve in all likelihood made this " generous " offer knowing that Hamas can’t deliver on that.
That is if they haven’t been tortured and killed prior to that already.
“Four of these units have effectively remediated these violations, which is what we expect partners to do … For a remaining unit, we continue to be in consultations and engagements with the government of Israel.”
The actions of IDF in the last six months, across the Palestinian territories, hardly support this notion.
Representatives of Palestinian groups Hamas and Fatah made “encouraging progress” in recent talks in the Chinese capital on promoting reconciliation, China’s foreign ministry said Tuesday.
Hamas and Fatah unity fills me dread rather than hope. It’s like Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir buddying up.
It has to happen, as a precondition for any peace. One of the reasons why every process has collapsed is because the Palestinian side of the table cannot actually deliver (which has mainly been Fatah), and is undercut by ‘the street’, which in practice has been more radical groups on the outside looking in. They have to be at the table in some sort of coalition, or the whole effort is pointless from the outset. The moderation of their views can come later - look at what happened in Northern Ireland.
I know, I know. I’m just too uncomfortable with the two cunts hobnobbing.
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https://twitter.com/LucBernard/status/1785267477519491439
Luc Bernard knows a lot he can’t post (such as number of hostages alive etc.)
Here is an article by him I have had open on my tab for a few days but never got around to post (just in case anyone in interested):
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/scott-richards-a-hostage-negotiators-perspective/
The troubling thing in there is a bit of a disconnect. He characterizes ISIS as an exception to normal hostage rules (i.e. their value is for open atrocity) but immediately states that Hamas is not ISIS (fair enough).
However, much of the rest of the discussion is how unclear the value that Hamas actually places on the hostages is, and how they are not behaving along the lines that suggest Hamas values them for exchange. That is only partially mitigated by the discussion of the possibility that many of the hostages are held by groups other than Hamas that may not value them the way Hamas does - which he then discusses as terror groups.
What about the many thousands of hostages (including children) that Israel holds?
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Inconvenient questions. What’s the standard Israel Govt rebuttal to this ?
Terrorists