Hamas has proposed a four-and-a-half-month ceasefire that would include the release of all hostages and the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip in order to reach an agreement to end the war, Reuters reported.

An Israeli government spokesman said Israel was carefully studying the proposal, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was due to hold a news conference later on Wednesday.

Israel’s Channel 13 quoted an official as saying some aspects were unacceptable, and officials were debating whether to reject the proposal or ask for changes.

The Hamas proposal, first reported by Reuters, is a response to an earlier proposal drawn up by US and Israeli intelligence chiefs and delivered to Hamas last week by Qatari and Egyptian mediators.

US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken discussed the proposal with Netanyahu after arriving in Israel following talks with the leaders of Qatar and Egypt, countries that have acted as mediators in the conflict.

Serious rifts remain between the two sides, with Israel previously saying it would not withdraw its troops from Gaza or end the war until Hamas was destroyed. But the sources described how Hamas is now taking a new approach to its demand for an end to the war, with the organization now proposing it as an issue to be resolved in future talks rather than a precondition for a ceasefire.

A source close to the talks said Hamas’ counteroffer did not require a guarantee of a permanent cease-fire from the outset, but that an end to the war must be reached before the last hostages can be freed.

A second source said Hamas is still seeking assurances from Qatar, Egypt and other friendly nations that the ceasefire will hold and not be broken after the release of the hostages.

“They want the aggression to stop, and not temporarily, not where (the Israelis) take hostages and then the Palestinian people live like in a meat grinder.”

Israeli government spokesman Avi Haiman told reporters: “We have received an update, we have received a message from the negotiators in Qatar. We analyze. The Mossad is carefully analyzing what was presented to us.”

Ezzat El-Reshik, a member of Hamas’ political bureau, said the group’s goal is to “stop aggression against our Palestinian people and ensure a full and lasting ceasefire, as well as aid, shelter and reconstruction.”

Hamas proposes three stages of a truce

Under the peace proposal seen by Reuters and confirmed by sources, during the first 45-day phase all Israeli hostages, men under 19, the elderly and the sick would be released in exchange for Palestinian women and children held in Israeli prisons . Israel will withdraw troops from the populated areas of Gaza.

The implementation of the second phase will not begin until the parties have completed “indirect discussions on the requirements necessary to end mutual military operations and return to complete calm.”

The second phase would involve the release of the remaining male hostages and a complete Israeli withdrawal from all of Gaza. The exchange of the remains of the dead took place at the third stage.

“People are optimistic, but at the same time they are praying that this hope will turn into a real deal that will end the war,” said Yamen Hamad, a father of four who lives at the UN school in Deir el-Balah. center of the Gaza Strip through a messaging app.

In Rafah, on the southern edge of the Gaza Strip, where half of the enclave’s 2.3 million residents have gathered on the border with Egypt, the bodies of 10 people killed by Israeli strikes overnight were placed in a hospital morgue.

At least two of the wrapped remains were the size of small children. Relatives were crying next to the dead.

“Every visit of Blinken, instead of calming the situation, he only worsens the situation, we get more strikes, we get more bombings,” Mohammad Abundi said.

Israel launched its military offensive after Hamas militants killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in southern Israel on October 7. Gaza’s health ministry says at least 27,585 Palestinians have been killed and thousands more are believed to be buried under the rubble. So far there was only one truce, which lasted only a week at the end of November.

Netanyahu is under pressure from far-right members of his coalition government, who say they will not support a deal that fails to wipe Hamas off the face of the earth, on the one hand, and the families of the hostages, who demand, on the other hand, that the deal will bring you home.

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How Hamas responds to the cease-fire agreement in Gaza / Main provisions of the agreement