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A senior member of Hamas runs the news agency AFP said last night that the group’s response to the proposed ceasefire deal, brokered by Egypt and Qatar, is currently “negative” but that discussions are still ongoing.

The group’s goal remains an “end to this war,” Suhail al-Hindi told AFP. Hamas is reportedly seeking a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, proposing a long-term reconstruction program under which Hamas commits not to rebuild military infrastructure.

That is at odds with the goals of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has said Israel plans to conduct a ground operation in Rafah regardless of the outcome of an agreement. Israel claims that Hamas fighters have fled to the south of the Gaza Strip. “We will enter Rafah and we will eliminate the Hamas battalions there, with or without an agreement,” Netanyahu said this week.

Hamas leader al-Hindi, who AFP speaking by telephone from a secret location, said there is “great interest from Hamas and all Palestinian resistance groups to put an end to this insane war against the Palestinian people.”

“But it will not be at any cost,” he added, stressing that the group “cannot under any circumstances raise the white flag or surrender to the conditions of the Israeli enemy.”