U.S. deputy national-security adviser Jonathan Finer said Sunday that the negotiations to secure the release of hostages held by Hamas have ironed out some disputes and that a deal is closer than it’s been since Israel was invaded.
“What I can say at this point is that some of the outstanding areas of disagreement, very complicated, very sensitive negotiation has been narrowed,” Finer said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “That I believe we are closer than we have been in quite some time, maybe closer than we have been since the beginning of this process to getting this deal done and we are following it minute by minute, hour by hour and have been for a number of weeks.”
While Finer presented a more hopeful timeline, he suggested that there are outstanding terms that need to be accepted by the parties before a deal can emerge. “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed,” he said. Qatar has been serving as mediator between Israel and Hamas.
The general arrangement so far is that Hamas will release some of the hostages abducted during the October 7 terror attack in exchange for a pause in fighting, sources with knowledge of the talks told NBC. Over 12 hostages could be freed, Finer said, without specifying an exact number or confirming whether they will be Americans or Israelis. He said “it would not be helpful to the completion of the deal” to say more.
Israel has maintained that over 240 hostages are in Hamas’s custody, likely in its underground network of terror tunnels in Gaza. Israeli soldiers in Gaza City located 35 tunnel shafts on Sunday, IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari wrote on X.
Earlier this month, it was revealed that the U.S. military has been flying unarmed MQ-9 Reaper drones over Gaza to help Israel apprehend and rescue hostages. Rather than support Israel’s military response, which has progressed into a ground operation, the surveillance flights are designed to find hostages, monitor for signs of life, and pass on intelligence to the Israel Defense Forces.
Finer’s comments come as President Biden’s approval rating sinks to 40 percent, with high dissatisfaction among Democrats over his administration’s management of foreign policy as well as its support for Israel in its war with Hamas, according to a new NBC poll. On foreign policy specifically, Biden’s approval is at 33 percent, down 8 percent from September. The poll showed a gaping generational divide on the Israel issue, with 53 percent of voters aged 65 and older approving of Biden’s leadership on it but only 20 percent of voters aged 18-34 approving.