President Joe Biden on Friday declared that it was time for war in Gaza to conclude as he laid out a multi-stage proposal already accepted by Israel that aims to ultimately facilitate an end to the fighting.
“It's time for this war to end, for the day after to begin,” Biden said during previously unscheduled remarks at the White House on Friday.
The four-and-a-half-page plan that Israel has agreed to, Biden said, includes three phases and was transmitted to Hamas by Qatar on Thursday. Hamas would still have to accept the plan for it to begin.
The first phase would last six weeks and include a “full and complete” cease-fire, the release of women, the elderly and the wounded still being held hostage by Hamas and the freeing of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israel. The next stage, which would be negotiated during the six-week cease-fire, would include a “permanent end to hostilities” and the release of all remaining hostages, which includes male soldiers. The last step is the movement toward a “major reconstruction” plan for Gaza that would include the return of the remains of dead hostages to their families.
The president cautioned that there are “a number of details” that have to be negotiated in order to move from the temporary cease-fire in stage one to the permanent end to hostilities in stage two but noted that the pause in fighting would continue as long as negotiations continued. The U.S., Egypt and Qatar – which has been leading negotiations between Israel and Hamas for months – would “work to ensure” talks continue, Biden said.
“This is truly a decisive moment,” Biden said. “Hamas says it wants a cease-fire – this deal is an opportunity to prove whether they really mean it, Hamas needs to take the deal.”
“For months, people all over the world have called for a cease-fire – now it's time to raise your voices and demand that Hamas comes to the table and agrees to this deal and ends this war that they began,” the president continued.
In a statement after Biden’s remarks, Hamas said it was ready to deal with any proposal in a “constructive manner,” multiple outlets reported.
Biden also acknowledged that some in Israel, including some in the government coalition, don’t agree with the proposal and instead want to occupy Gaza and keep fighting “for years.”
“I ask you to take a step back,” Biden said of his message to them. “Think what will happen if this moment is lost – we can't lose this moment.”
The president added that Hamas is “no longer capable of carrying out another Oct. 7.”
Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel left about 1,200 people dead and sparked the now more than seven-month-old war in Gaza. Biden has faced mounting pressure on the international stage and from some at home over his continued support of Israel as the Palestinian death toll has risen and the humanitarian crisis worsened in Gaza amid Israel’s retaliatory campaign.
The president on Friday also noted that phase one of the plan would allow a “surge” of 600 trucks of humanitarian aid into Gaza each day.
Earlier this month, Biden offered some of his harshest language toward Israel since the start of the war, threatening to halt future shipments of offensive weapons that could be used to attack Rafah if Israel proceeded with a major ground operation in the southern Gaza city, where more than one million civilians have been taking shelter.
Since then, the administration has insisted that Israel’s actions in Rafah have not amounted to what it considers a “major ground operation” even after an Israeli strike over the weekend left dozens of Palestinians in a tent compound dead.