The White House announces that Israel would start daily 4-hour pauses in its military operations in Gaza

Israel has consented to proceed with daily four-hour pauses of military operations in parts of northern Gaza, the White House announced on Thursday.

The action seemed to formalize a pattern of stopping the fighting to let civilians escape the fighting and to allow humanitarian aid to enter the enclave.

Israel has been pausing hostilities for hours at a time so that people can flee south during the previous few days. In a statement on Thursday night, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu emphasized that there would be "no ceasefire" unless Hamas released its hostages.

Spokesman for the National Security Council John Kirby described the decision to permit four-hour breaks as a constructive "first step" toward alleviating the humanitarian situation in Gaza. He said Israel would provide three hours' notice before the pauses began.

"“We’ve been told by the Israelis that there would be no military actions in these regions over the term of the halt, and that this process is starting today,” Kirby said, calling it “steps in the right direction.”"

Speaking immediately after at Joint Base Andrews, President Joe Biden claimed, during a phone call on Monday, that he had put pressure on Netanyahu to consent to noticeably longer breaks in the fighting.

Biden told reporters, "I've been asking for a pause for a lot more than three days," and subsequently, "I've asked for even a longer pause for some of them."