As the US president’s term ends, repeated attempts to secure a ceasefire and end Israel’s war have failed.

US President Joe Biden has avoided answering a question about whether he has any hope of reaching a ceasefire and returning Israeli captives to the Gaza Strip before the end of his term.

“You think you can avoid getting hit in the head by a camera behind you?” the acting president said at the White House on Tuesday after an Israeli journalist asked if a deal might be possible by January.

Biden made the comments, according to a White House transcript, at the start of a meeting with Israeli President Isaac Herzog as they were surrounded in the Oval Office by reporters and cameras.

Neria Kraus, the journalist who asked the question and posted a video on the social media platform X, wrote that “the political reality is such that President Biden, who pledged to bring the hostages home, could not give me an answer clear on this. very critical question about getting a hostage deal by the end of his term.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been repeatedly accused — including from within Israel — of sabotaging efforts to end the war as he tries to keep his far-right government in power. He caused a stir in the country after he fired his defense minister, Yoav Gallant.

While Israel’s new foreign minister, Gideon Saar, said this week that “some progress” had been made in ceasefire talks in Lebanon – Hezbollah claiming it had yet to receive any peace proposals – Israeli authorities reported that there are no substantial ongoing talks on Gaza.

Some in Gaza and Lebanon are worried that Donald Trump’s re-election as US president could spell greater disaster for the besieged and displaced people in both territories.

During Tuesday’s meeting with Herzog, Biden reiterated that “my commitment to Israel is firm and we share a deep friendship.”

I asked President Biden if he thinks he can get a hostage deal done by the end of his term. He replied, commenting on the number of cameramen in the room: “do you think you can get hit in the head by the camera behind you?” pic.twitter.com/B3DCJoHdaw

— Neria Kraus (@NeriaKraus) November 12, 2024

The Israeli president began by discussing Hezbollah’s latest attacks on Israel, but also noted that Israel still has 101 prisoners in the Gaza Strip more than 400 days after the enclave’s war began.

Herzog said they must be returned to Israel safely “because they are going through hell in the prisons of Gaza,” to which Biden agreed.

Qatar said it had suspended mediation efforts between Hamas and Israel until the sides show their “willingness and seriousness” to end the war in Gaza.

The US said support for Israel would continue after a 30-day deadline to increase aid to Gaza or face cuts in arms funding, despite a warning from eight aid groups.

Joyce Msuya, acting head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said the world was “witnessing acts reminiscent of the worst international crimes in Gaza”, while Israel dismissed warnings of famine in the enclave as ” slanderous”. .

On Wednesday, the Israeli military issued several forced displacement orders for Lebanon’s Haret Hreik and Ghobeiry municipalities as it launched attacks on the capital, Beirut, as its forces pounded Gaza and continued their offensive in the enclave’s north.

Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 43,665 Palestinians and injured 103,076 since October 7, 2023, as a serious humanitarian crisis worsens in the enclave. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks that day and more than 200 were taken captive.

In Lebanon, at least 3,287 people have been killed and 14,222 wounded in Israeli attacks since the start of the Gaza war.