2023-12-02 23:58:20
The number two of Hamas, Saleh al-Arouri, stated this Saturday on the Al Jazeera television channel that there will be no more hostage exchanges with Israel until the war in Gaza ends and all Gazan captives are released.
(You can read: Israel withdraws its negotiation team in Qatar after the dialogue with Hamas stalls)
“There are no truce negotiations now. The Israeli hostages will not be released unless there is a ceasefire and all Palestinian detainees are released,” he said. “Let the war take its course. This decision is final,” he added.
For its part, Israel announced that it had withdrawn from the Doha negotiations that led to the November 24 ceasefire mediated by Qatar and supported by Egypt and the United States.
(You can read: Israel leaves 200 dead in 24 hours after resuming its offensive in Gaza)
“Due to the deadlock in negotiations and at the direction of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the head of the Mossad (secret services), David Barnea, ordered his team in Doha to return to Israel,” Netanyahu’s office said.
The two sides accused each other of the resumption of fighting.
Israel assured that Hamas, an organization considered terrorist by the United States, the European Union and Israel, tried to attack it with rockets in the middle of the truce and that it stopped presenting lists of hostages that it was willing to release.
(Also: Israel had the Hamas attack plan more than a year ago and rejected it: report)
Hamas, for its part, assured that it proposed “an exchange of prisoners and the elderly” and the delivery of bodies of hostages “who lost their lives in the Israeli bombings” in Gaza, but that Israel, “which had already made the decision to resume the aggression, he did not respond.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu affirmed this Saturday that Israel will continue the war against Hamas “until all its objectives are achieved,” which include the release of Israeli hostages and the elimination of the Palestinian Islamist movement in power in Gaza.
(We recommend: What the Israeli children kidnapped by Hamas experienced)
“Our soldiers prepared during the days of truce for a complete victory against Hamas,” Netanyahu declared in his first press conference since the resumption of fighting on Friday morning, following a week-long ceasefire.
INTERNATIONAL EDITORIAL
*With information from AFP
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