According to Israeli media reports, the United States is prepared to guarantee that Israel will be allowed to resume its genocidal war in Gaza after the first stage of any hostage deal and ceasefire that may be reached with Hamas.

Talks on a ceasefire and prisoner exchange have been stalled since Israel assassinated Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh, and it is unclear when those negotiations will resume, but the United States and Israel are discussing possible proposals.

In response to a question from Al-Quds correspondent in Washington on Wednesday about the stagnation of ceasefire negotiations, not only since the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week, but practically since the US president announced his proposal on May 31, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said: “First of all, we have come a long way in reaching an agreement on the proposal. When you look at the agreement – the parts of the proposal that both sides have agreed to – it is a great step forward compared to what it was a few months ago.”

"There are a lot of things that are responsible for this, but one of them is the hard work that the governments of the United States, the governments of Egypt, the governments of Qatar have put in to try to get this proposal through and to come up with an agreed framework," he added.

“Now, nothing is final until everything is final, so we need to reach an agreement on these final issues,” Miller said. “And so all we can do as the United States is push all the parties involved to come to an agreement, work diplomatically, try to get them to come to an agreement, and continue to convince every party in the region that further escalation of the conflict threatens the ability to reach a ceasefire, and risks sliding the region into further conflict and violence and broader war. So it’s not in anyone’s interest to take these additional escalatory steps.”

The proposal being discussed includes three stages in which Israel will halt its military operations and Hamas will release the hostages, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants an American guarantee that he will be able to resume military operations after the first stage, a point that Netanyahu will stress when negotiations resume, according to American and Israeli media sources.

But the United States has yet to provide a written agreement that it will allow Israel to resume operations, but it has expressed its approval of the idea. Yedioth Ahronoth reported that the United States will not provide the guarantees in writing until an agreement is reached with Hamas. The Israeli condition could make Hamas less inclined to agree to any deal, as one of its main demands has been a permanent ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. In previous negotiations, Hamas agreed to language that was vague enough that Israel could accept it without actually committing to a permanent ceasefire. But it is unclear whether Hamas would agree to a deal in which Israel received an explicit guarantee from the United States that it could resume military operations.

In the weeks and months before Haniyeh’s assassination, Netanyahu had been working to sabotage the chances of reaching a deal. After Hamas conceded that it would not seek guarantees of a permanent cease-fire in advance, Netanyahu began making new public demands that Mossad director David Barnea, the Israeli official in charge of the talks, said would thwart an agreement.