Hamas rejects ‘new conditions’ of Gaza truce proposal
Hamas on Friday rejected the ‘new conditions’ of a proposed US truce in the Gaza Strip after two days of talks in Qatar in which the Palestinian Islamist movement did not participate.
US President Joe Biden, who after presenting the proposal said it was ‘closer than ever’ to an agreement, warned that no actor in the region ‘should take action to undermine this process’.
After more than ten months of war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, the mediating countries in the conflict (Qatar, Egypt and the United States) organised new negotiations in Doha to reach an agreement that would also avert the possibility of an escalation of the conflict with Iran and its regional allies.
But Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, rejected what it saw as Israel's ‘new conditions’ in the proposal, said two leaders of the group who requested anonymity.
‘We will not accept anything less than a complete ceasefire, a full withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Strip, the return of displaced persons and an agreement to exchange’ Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners, said one of the sources.
The Palestinian movement is demanding implementation of the original three-phase plan announced by Biden in late May. The first phase calls for a six-week truce and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from densely populated areas of Gaza, as well as a swap of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners.
The ‘compromise proposal’, which the White House said was presented by the United States and endorsed by Qatar and Egypt, however, envisages keeping Israeli troops in the Gaza Strip along the border with Egypt, said one of the two Hamas leaders.
A source privy to the talks told AFP that Hamas also opposes giving Israel the right to veto the release of certain Palestinian prisoners and prevent them from returning to Gaza.
International pressure
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged the mediators to put ‘pressure’ on Hamas to accept ‘the principles’ of the plan presented by Biden.
The talks, which also seek to avoid a military escalation in the Middle East, will resume next week in Cairo, the White House said.
US Chief of Mission Antony Blinken will travel to Israel at the weekend to support efforts to reach a truce in Gaza.
The international community has stepped up pressure in recent weeks, believing that a truce in Gaza could de-escalate tensions in the rest of the region.
Iran and its allies vowed to avenge the death of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a 31 July attack in Tehran blamed on Israel. The day before, the military chief of the powerful Lebanese Hezbollah movement was also killed in an Israeli bombing near Beirut.
Tehran will suffer ‘catastrophic’ consequences should it launch an attack on Israel, said a senior US official who requested anonymity, warning against any military action that could ‘derail’ negotiations.
‘They kill us’
Netanyahu insists he will continue the war in Gaza until Hamas, considered by Israel, the United States and the European Union to be a terrorist organisation, is destroyed.
The conflict erupted on 7 October, when Islamist militiamen killed 1,198 people and kidnapped 251 in southern Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official data.
Of the 251 people abducted, 111 remain in Gaza, although 39 have been declared dead by the Israeli army.
Israel's retaliatory offensive in Gaza has left at least 40,005 people dead, according to the Hamas government's health ministry, which does not detail how many are civilians and fighters.
Israel said on Thursday that its offensive allowed it to ‘eliminate more than 17,000 terrorists’.
‘Why did Netanyahu send a delegation to the negotiations while we are being killed here?’ asked Mohammed al-Balwi amid rubble in Jabalia in northern Gaza.
In addition to leaving a territory in ruins, the conflict triggered a humanitarian crisis in the territory, where almost all of its 2.4 million inhabitants have been displaced.
The Palestinian Authority health ministry reported the first case of polio in 25 years in Gaza on Friday, shortly after the UN called for ‘humanitarian pauses’ in the fighting to vaccinate children.
Witnesses on Friday reported Israeli shelling in the centre of the territory and near Khan Younis in the far south of the enclave.
The war in Gaza also intensified violence in the occupied West Bank, where dozens of Israeli Jewish settlers stormed the Palestinian village of Jid on Thursday night.
During the attack, they set fire to buildings and vehicles and threw stones and Molotov cocktails, according to the Israeli army.
According to the Palestinian Authority, which partly administers the territory, one 23-year-old man was shot dead and another injured.