Israel-Hamas ceasefire now 'more likely,' US security official says

The chance for an end to more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and the release of about 100 hostages held by the militants is now “more likely” because of last week’s ceasefire reached by Israel with Hezbollah in Lebanon, a top U.S. national security official said Sunday.

The U.S. and other negotiators “may have a chance” to end 14 months of fighting in Gaza, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN’s “State of the Union” show but declined to make a prediction, “because we’ve come close before.”

Israel’s mostly ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog, said Sunday, "There are negotiations taking place behind the scenes, and it can be done.”

Sullivan told NBC’s “Meet the Press” show, “We are engaged deeply with the key players in the region, and there is activity even today. There will be further conversations and consultations, and our hope is that we can generate a ceasefire and hostage deal, but we're not there yet.”

Sullivan spoke a day after Hamas released a videotape of one of the hostages, Israeli American Edan Alexander. Speaking under duress, Alexander blamed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, saying, "The prime minister is supposed to protect his soldiers and citizens, and you abandoned us.”

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Sullivan said the video was “a cruel reminder of Hamas' brutality and of the fact that they are holding so many hostages from so many countries.”

Hamas triggered the war with Israel, killing about 1,200 people and capturing 250 hostages in the attack 14 months ago. Israel says that about a third of the remaining 100 or so hostages are believed to be dead.

In its counteroffensive, Israel has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were combatants. Israel, without providing evidence, says it has killed more than 17,000 militants.

Sullivan called the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire, which has largely been holding steady, “a huge step forward in the Middle East … the opportunity for people to ultimately be able to return to their homes in Israel and in Lebanon.”

He said the United States, France and other allies “are going to work together with the Lebanese Armed Forces through a mechanism to ensure that the ceasefire is implemented effectively. Our goal is to get through these first few days, critical days of a ceasefire, when it's most fragile, have it take full hold, and then ultimately build on it so that it becomes the permanent ceasefire it's intended to be.”

Whether the Israel-Hezbollah pact translates into a ceasefire in Gaza remains uncertain.

The United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent much of the past year trying to broker a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of the remaining hostages. But the talks have been stalemated, with Israel rejecting Hamas' demand for a complete withdrawal from the territory and Israel demanding that any vestige of Hamas control in the narrow territory along the Mediterranean Sea be erased.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to end the wars in the Middle East, without saying how, and pushed Israel to end its fight against Hamas before he takes office January 20. Trump, like Biden, has been a staunch defender of Israel’s prerogative to defend itself.

On the Gaza war front, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees said Sunday it is halting aid deliveries through the main cargo crossing into Gaza because of the threat of armed gangs who have looted recent convoys. It blamed the breakdown of law and order on Israeli policies. Israel had no immediate comment.

Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, the main aid provider in Gaza, said the route leading to the Kerem Shalom crossing is too dangerous on the Gaza side. Armed men looted nearly 100 trucks traveling on the route in mid-November, and he said gangs stole a smaller shipment Saturday.

Kerem Shalom is the only crossing between Israel and Gaza that is designed for cargo shipments and has been the main artery for aid deliveries since the Rafah crossing with Egypt was shut down in May. Last month, nearly two-thirds of all aid entering Gaza came through Kerem Shalom, and in previous months it accounted for an even larger amount, according to Israeli figures.

In a post on X, Lazzarini largely blamed Israel for the breakdown of humanitarian operations in Gaza, citing "political decisions to restrict the amounts of aid," lack of safety on aid routes and Israel's targeting of the Hamas-run police force, which had previously provided public security.

Meanwhile, Israeli strikes in Gaza killed at least six people overnight, including two young children, ages 6 and 8, in the tent where their family was sheltering, medical officials said Sunday.

The strike in the Muwasi area, a sprawling tent camp housing hundreds of thousands of displaced people, also wounded the children's mother and their 8-month-old sister, according to Nasser Hospital.

In still another Mideast conflict, the Syrian military rushed in reinforcements to push back insurgents from advancing farther after they seized Aleppo in a surprise offensive.

The insurgents look over most of the Syrian city Saturday and claimed to have entered the city of Hama.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is traveling to the Syrian capital Damascus later Sunday. He told reporters that Tehran will back the Syrian government and army.

The swift insurgent offensive is an embarrassment for Syria's President Bashar al-Assad and comes at a time when his allies — Iran and its militant groups and Russia — are preoccupied with their own conflicts.