2024-02-01 22:50:00
Some 184,000 Palestinians registered to ask for humanitarian aid after being forced to leave southern Gaza / Photo: AFP.
The Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas gave “positive preliminary confirmation” to a proposed truce with Israel in Gaza, the spokesman for Qatar’s foreign ministry said Thursday, while the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) warned that it could be seen forced to cease operations throughout the Middle East “at the end of February” because 13 countries suspended their donations after Israel accused its employees of being involved in the October 7 attack.
Representatives of the United States, Qatar, Egypt and Israel drafted a proposal for a truce and exchange of hostages captured by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas in its attack on Israel for Palestinian prisoners detained in Israel over the weekend in Paris.
“The Paris meeting served to consolidate the proposals; “The proposal was approved by the Israeli side and now we have a first positive confirmation from the Hamas side,” said the Qatari spokesman, Majed al Ansari.
However, Israel’s Channel 13 News cited a senior Israeli official who denied that the Hebrew country had approved it.
Meanwhile, Israel’s Channel 12 said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government had not yet received any formal response from Qatar to the proposed deal.
Israel’s War Cabinet was meeting at the time Qatar announced the agreement in principle, the Times of Israel reported.
“The road ahead is still very difficult, but we are optimistic because both sides accepted the premises that would lead to a pause (in fighting); we hope to be in a position to announce good news in this regard in the next two weeks.” , added the Qatari official, according to the AFP news agency.
The head of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, exiled in Qatar, was due to arrive in Egypt between this Thursday and Friday, and was expected to address this proposal there.
Majed Al Ansari, spokesperson for the Qatari Foreign Ministry / Photo: Captura TV
A Hamas source had previously indicated that the Islamist movement, in power in Gaza since 2007, was examining a proposed three-phase agreement.
The first would include a six-week truce during which Israel would release between 200 and 300 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for 35 to 40 hostages. In addition, between 200 and 300 trucks of humanitarian aid could enter Gaza each day.
Hamas demands a complete ceasefire as a precondition to any agreement, while the Israeli Government limits itself to talking about a pause in the fighting, but not about ending its operation in Gaza.
“We will not withdraw the army from the Gaza Strip or free thousands of terrorists. None of that will happen,” Netanyahu said this week.
To bolster negotiations for a second truce, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will return to the Middle East “in the coming days”, officials said.
Israel launched its operation on October 7, after hundreds of Hamas militiamen infiltrated from Gaza murdered some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped another 240, including twenty Argentines, that day in southern Israel.
The Palestinian enclave’s Health Ministry said Thursday that at least 27,019 Palestinians, mostly women, children and adolescents, have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of Israel’s offensive, and that at least 66,139 have been wounded.
Israel and Hamas agreed, since October, to a single truce at the end of November for one week and with the mediation of Qatar, Egypt and the United States, which allowed the exchange of a hundred hostages for Palestinians imprisoned in Israeli jails.
Despite ongoing efforts to agree on a truce, Israel and Hamas continued clashing this Thursday in the Gaza Strip.
At night, Witnesses reported Israeli shelling near the Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, the large southern Gaza city where Israel believes local Hamas leaders are hiding, and which is the current epicenter of the offensive.
Israel announced days ago that it had surrounded the city and, after claiming to have defeated Hamas in its eastern part, is now concentrating its actions in the western area.
At least 27,019 Palestinians were killed and more than 66,000 injured in Israeli bombings / Photo: AFP.
Some 184,000 Palestinians have registered for humanitarian aid after being forced to leave the area under Israeli evacuation orders, the UN said. who spoke of “intense bombings” throughout Gaza and, especially, in Khan Yunis.
Nearly four months of war have devastated the Gaza Strip, where Israel at times imposed strict blockades on humanitarian aid.
The population “is dying of hunger,” the director of the health emergencies program of the World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Wednesday. Michael Ryan.
In addition, the territory is “uninhabitable”, with half of its buildings destroyed, the UN conference on Trade and Development stated in a report.
The situation risks getting worse due to the suspension of donations from several countries to UNRWA.
“If funding remains suspended, we will most likely have to cease our operations at the end of February, not only in Gaza, but throughout the region,” UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini said in a statement.
The agency is also present in the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan.
Several donor countries announced the suspension of their aid after Israel claimed that 12 employees participated in the October 7 Hamas attacks.
Faced with the barrage of financial aid suspensions, Guterres met with major donors in New York on Wednesday.
Israel accused UNRWA of allowing Hamas to use the agency’s infrastructure in Gaza for military activities.
U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said Sunday that of the 12 employees indicted by Israel, nine were immediately fired, one was confirmed dead and the identity of the other two was “being clarified.” He also called on all countries to maintain their funding to the organization.
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