Netanyahu Authorizes New Talks To Free All Hostages On ‘Acceptable’ Terms

Just as President Trump has of late highlighted the severe starvation crisis impacting Gaza’s children and vast majority of civilians, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday has confirmed that he has instructed negotiations to begin for the release of all remaining hostages. 

He declared that he wants to end to the war in Gaza on terms “acceptable to Israel”. Still, his expanded ground operation will proceed, and while addressing Israeli troops he made clear that his cabinet approved plans for a large-scale assault on Gaza City.

His dispatching a negotiating team once again (to an as yet undetermined location – probably Doha) appears in immediate response to Hamas reportedly agreeing to a proposal drawn up by Qatari and Egyptian mediators for a 60-day ceasefire.

Also, huge protests against Netanyahu’s policies have persisted in Tel Aviv and other cities have only grown over the past days and week.

Netanyahu did not yet accept the deal, and is at least ready to ‘talk’ about it – but this pattern of futile engagements in Qatar or Egypt has happened plenty of times before.

“I have come to approve the IDF’s (Israel Defense Forces) plans to take control of Gaza City and defeat Hamas,” Netanyahu said.

“These two matters – defeating Hamas and releasing all our hostages – go hand in hand,” Netanyahu added, without disclosing any further details.

He’s long come under fire domestically, and from the political opposition, for prioritizing a military solution ahead of the return of the hostages.

It’s not just Israeli media documenting starvation in Gaza. Trump himself said Gazan children are suffering from starvation and that only the “coldhearted” or “nuts” deny it.

Yet Bari Weiss and Free Press cling to their government’s line of denialism:pic.twitter.com/WQXqVni9nN https://t.co/T9bJOtxvyh

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 21, 2025

Meanwhile, Israel and Mideast regional sources are reporting on a “classified Israeli military database shows the vast majority of Palestinians killed in Gaza are civilians, according to a joint investigation by The Guardian, +972 Magazine, and Local Call.” This figure is put at 83% of the war dead as being civilians.

“Figures reviewed by the outlets revealed on Thursday indicate that, as of May 2025 – 19 months into Israel’s war on Gaza – Israeli military intelligence had listed 8,900 fighters from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) as confirmed or ‘probably’ dead,” according to the fresh reporting.