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Benjamin Netanyahu has been the real barrier to a ceasefire in Gaza, not Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, according to the president of the Palestinian National Institute.

“(Sinwar’s death) will not really help or improve the situation because where he was not the obstacle to achieving a ceasefire, the real obstacle to achieving a ceasefire is Netanyahu,” Mustafa Barghouti told Sky News.

Watch: IDF shows Sinwar’s ‘final moments’

Evidence for his claim, he said that Hamas had accepted a ceasefire proposal presented by US President Joe Biden earlier this year, but that Netanyahu “changed his mind” and rejected it.

Biden outlined a three-phase plan in May, with a first phase lasting six weeks and including a “complete and comprehensive” ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from all populated areas of Gaza and “the liberation of a series of hostages, including women, elderly, wounded in exchange for the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners”.

“Hamas was ready for the deal,” Barghouti said, before claiming the Israeli prime minister preferred war to the return of the hostages and rejected it.

“Not only does Netanyahu want to continue the fighting, he is expanding this war … in Lebanon and now he wants to create a huge war with Iran, hoping to drag even the United States into it,” he added.

When pressed Sir Trevor Phillips, Sky News presenter On whether Hamas really wants a ceasefire, given that it carried out the October 7 attacks against Israel that reignited the conflict in the Middle East, Barghouti said these attacks were not “a cause” of war.

“(The October 7 attacks were) a result, the result of the fact that Israel has been carrying out ethnic cleansing against Palestinians since 1948.”

Watch the full interview with Mr. Barghouti with Sir Trevor here.