00:00 Okay. Well, tell us what the latest – your latest understanding is of the – this alleged
00:06 deal.
00:09 With respect to hostages, so what I will say is that we are very close to an agreement,
00:13 but we are not there yet. As you have heard us say a number of times over the course of
00:18 the past few weeks, nothing is final until everything is final. And at this point, everything
00:23 is not yet final, but we are close. The Israeli cabinet is meeting to discuss this matter
00:29 right now. We are in close conversation with them, as we are with the Government of Qatar,
00:34 who has been helping facilitate discussions for the – since the early days of the crisis.
00:39 We are hopeful to have some good news for the hostages and their families. We are hopeful
00:43 we can start bringing some of them home. But as I said at the outset, we are not quite
00:46 there yet.
00:47 All right. Well, so when you made reference to the Israeli cabinet meeting right now,
00:55 is that the last thing that needs to be done?
00:59 I really don't want to get into the underlying details. Obviously, the Israeli Government
01:04 discussing and coming to some sort of resolution is one part of this. There are others. I don't
01:10 want to get into the full details. I will say that, of course, the implementation and
01:15 execution of an agreement, should one be reached, requires the cooperation of Hamas, a terrorist
01:21 organization. So it's why we're always hesitant to say too much about what will happen
01:27 before it has happened, but we are close to an agreement and hopeful one can be reached.
01:31 All right.
01:32 Thanks.
01:33 Yeah.
01:34 Is your understanding that the first tranche of hostages to be released would include Americans?
01:37 I just can't get into any type of details about what an agreement would look like, including
01:43 who would be released if such an agreement was finalized.
01:46 And have you received any updates on their conditions, whereabouts, if they're being
01:49 held together, if they are all, in fact, being held by Hamas?
01:54 I can't get into – too much into the underlying details. It has always been our assessment
01:59 that Hamas may not have control of all of these hostages. But beyond that, I just don't
02:04 want to speak to any specific details.
02:06 Yeah.
02:07 And – oh, sorry. Sorry.
02:08 And – sorry, can I follow up? Is it your understanding that if and when a deal is reached,
02:13 that would then trigger more aid being able to get into Gaza, as the Secretary had suggested
02:19 would happen?
02:20 I can only say a couple things about that. One, it has always been the position of the
02:23 United States that we do not need a hostage deal. There shouldn't – to get more aid
02:28 in, that more fuel, more food, more water, more medicine should not be contingent on
02:35 a hostage agreement being reached. We thought that the delivery of humanitarian assistance
02:39 for the Palestinian people was important in its own right, and that's why the Secretary
02:43 has been pushing for it. It's why the President has been pushing for it. It's what our Ambassador
02:46 David Satterfield – or Special Envoy, I should say – Ambassador David Satterfield
02:51 has been working to implement on the ground. That said, it has been clear that for some
02:56 time that an agreement on hostages would release or would unlock the potential for delivery
03:03 of more humanitarian assistance, so we're hopeful that that would take place. But again,
03:06 it has always been our position that the two don't need to be linked, that humanitarian
03:10 assistance should be delivered as quickly as possible for the benefit of the Palestinian
03:14 people.
03:15 QUESTION: But it doesn't seem to have linked it, it seems.
03:16 MR PRICE: It does seem – the way I would say it is it does appear that any kind of
03:21 hostage agreement, should we reach one, would unlock more humanitarian assistance flowing
03:25 in.
03:26 Barbara.
03:27 QUESTION: Actually, that was similar to my question, but on the understanding that that
03:32 is what you're hoping for, have you made extra preparations? I mean, are you poised
03:38 to move quickly to get more aid in? Like, what's the activity around that?
03:44 MR PRICE: We have been working to – not just related to any hostage arrangement, but
03:48 we have been working independent of that to facilitate the delivery of more humanitarian
03:53 assistance in. And so you've seen U.S. aid fly more humanitarian assistance into Egypt
03:58 to have it prepositioned so it could go into Gaza. Some of that aid has started to move.
04:02 We've been working with other international donors to facilitate the delivery of aid to
04:05 Egypt to go in through RAFA. And then, of course, there's the screening process that
04:08 has been a bit of an impediment to the fast delivery of aid. And we have been working
04:14 with the Government of Israel, with the Government of Egypt on all of these matters to try to
04:19 increase the flow of humanitarian assistance.
04:22 You saw a breakthrough last week, an initial breakthrough, when we saw an agreement to
04:25 deliver fuel in, which of course is important to ensure that water can be desalinated. It's
04:31 important to ensure that there's electricity for hospitals. It's important to ensure that
04:36 the implementers, the organizations that actually deliver the humanitarian assistance inside
04:41 Gaza, once it goes through RAFA into Gaza, that they can deliver it to the people who
04:45 need it. So we have been pushing all those things independent of any potential hostage
04:50 arrangement and will continue to do so.
