Why is stage two of the hostage deal so unlikely?

Despite the efforts on the part of the Trump administration and mediators to move forward with stage two of the hostage deal, reaching that stage is "very distant" according to a report today (Sunday) by Kikar Hashabbat reporter Yishai Cohen.

In a report for Channel 12 News, Cohen said that the second stage's conditions: that Israel officially and permanently declare an end to the war with Hamas in Gaza, and that Hamas be exiled and neutralized as a military and governing force in Gaza, are unacceptable to both sides.

Hamas has repeatedly used the release of hostages as an opportunity to demonstrate how it still controls the Gaza Strip militarily and civilly, setting up roadblocks and police forces and showing armed and masked armed forces on stage with the released hostages.

In negotiating with Egypt, they have shown an interest in shared governing bodies with Fatah and the Palestinian Authority to run the Gaza Strip, but not in giving up all power as demanded by Israel and the United States.

Meanwhile, Bezalel Smotrich and even Likud Minister Amichai Chikli have threatened to resign from the government if Israel moves ahead with withdrawing from the Philadelphi Corridor or moves ahead with the second stage of the deal and agrees to end the war.

Prime Minister Netanyahu himself has repeatedly and consistently insisted that the government has not given up its aims of disarming and destroying Hamas' governing and military capacity, regardless of the hostages, a policy statement which Cohen says is impossible to square with a declared end to the war in exchange for the remaining hostages.