The News
Separate sets of high-stakes negotiations to end major wars in the Middle East and Africa appeared to get off to poor starts.
Mediators are hosting talks in Geneva in an effort to end the 16-month civil war in Sudan, but so far neither side has actually sat down at the negotiation table.
Meanwhile, in Doha, Hamas said they will not participate in talks brokered by international mediators from the US, Egypt, and Qatar. Israel said it would send a delegation to the talks, but a deal looks remote as both sides accused each other of trying to undermine the process.
SIGNALS
Fears of all-out war in Middle East grow
Ahead of the talks in Doha, Hamas said it wouldn’t attend but is open to discussions with mediators “later,” Reuters reported. Hamas and Israel have accused each other of not being truly invested in securing a ceasefire. The stalled talks are fueling fears of a larger war with Iran that could destabilize the region. It could also imperil Netanyahu’s delicate domestic position, one analyst said. The prime minister “seems to believe he can benefit politically from the prolonging of a war situation in Gaza,” Nimrod Goren, the president of the Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies, told The New Arab. “But I don’t think having this regional flare-up… is in his interest.”
Neither side arrives for Sudan talks in Geneva
While both the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces said they would attend discussions in Geneva, as of Wednesday, neither side had arrived. Peace activists in Sudan have criticized the talks for failing to bring both sides together: “If you failed to bring all principal negotiators to the table, what is the point of launching an aborted process?” activist Musaad Abdullah told The Africa Report. The disjointed talks are not a good look for mediators from the US, as neither side appears to take the discussions seriously. “The US just looks silly and disconnected from all political reality and the facts on the ground,” Cameron Houston, a senior fellow in the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the outlet.