Tel Aviv, Israel - Chances of a ceasefire in Gaza are at rock-bottom after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected making any "concessions" in talks that he has been actively obstructing for months.

Netanyahu told a televised press conference at the end of a day of nationwide protests that he would "not give in to pressure" to moderate demands that are making a hostage deal with Hamas impossible.

Analyst Mairav Zonszein of the International Crisis Group said Netanyahu's remarks showed "he won't stop the war... until Hamas surrenders, and he basically announced there won't be a hostage deal."

Netanyahu "wants to occupy Gaza on some level indefinitely" and was now "just saying it more openly," she told AFP. Despite "huge opposition" among Israelis who support a ceasefire deal, "there's also nobody in the political realm that's able to challenge him."

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Gripped by grief and fury after six dead hostages were recovered from Gaza, Israelis took to the streets on Sunday and Monday to ramp up pressure on their government to secure the release of the remaining captives.

The military said the six were all captured alive during Hamas's October 7 attack on southern Israel that triggered the war, and shot dead by the captors shortly before troops had found them.

"These murderers executed six of our hostage," said Netanyahu, who has increasingly faced accusations from critics, analysts, and Hamas officials of prolonging the mass slaughter in Gaza for political gain.

President Joe Biden, who on Monday met negotiators working alongside Qatar and Egypt to try to secure a truce deal, replied "no" when asked by reporters in Washington if he thought Netanyahu was doing enough to secure a hostage deal.

Netanyahu brushed off the remark, saying he did not believe Biden had meant it.

Instead, he insisted Israel must control Gaza's border with Egypt, all while presenting a map of Israel that incorporated the illegally occupied West Bank, which Israeli forces have been brutally besieging for days on end.

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Israeli left-leaning daily Haaretz said Netanyahu was "masking his motives with security concerns" but said he was primarily concerned with his own political survival.

"His coalition... might unravel if a Gaza deal goes through," it said.

Of 251 hostages seized by Palestinian militants during the October 7 attack, 97 remain in Gaza, including 33 the Israeli military says are dead. Scores were released during a one-week truce in November – the only one so far.

Meanwhile, Israel has killed well over 40,000 people in Gaza, rendering the territory virtually uninhabitable, and creating catastrophic humanitarian conditions that have led to outbreaks of polio and hepatitis.

The Biden administration has been in lockstep with its ally all the way, furnishing it with the vast majority of weapons used to kill tens of thousands of civilians, the majority of whom are women and children.