Effort for truce in Gaza increases and Hamas will respond to Israel on Monday

Diplomatic efforts were increasingly intense this Sunday (28) to reach a truce and the release of hostages in Gaza. The Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas announced that it will respond on Monday to Israel’s latest proposal to stop bombings in the territory.

“A Hamas delegation, led by Khalil Al Hayya, will arrive in Egypt tomorrow […] and will present the movement’s response” to the Israeli proposal, a high-ranking source from the Palestinian Islamist group, who requested anonymity, told AFP.

The Israeli government faces growing pressure, internally and abroad, to establish an agreement that would allow it to end almost seven months of war in Gaza, governed by Hamas since 2007.

Khalil Al Hayya, number two of the movement’s political wing in Gaza, announced on Saturday that Hamas was examining the response to a counterproposal from Israel.

Qatar, Egypt and the United States act as mediators and try to obtain a new ceasefire for the narrow and devastated territory, where almost the entire population is close to a famine, according to the UN.

The American news portal Axios reported, based on two high-ranking Israeli government officials, that the country’s most recent proposal includes the willingness to discuss the “reestablishment of sustainable calm” in Gaza after the release of hostages.

This is the first time in nearly seven months of war that Israeli officials have suggested they are open to discussing an end to the war, according to Axios.

A Hamas source, who is following the negotiations, told AFP that the group is “open to discussing the new proposal in a positive way”.

The source added that the group wants to “reach an agreement that guarantees a permanent ceasefire, the return of displaced people, an acceptable agreement to exchange [de prisioneiros] and the end of the siege in Gaza.”

– New impetus to negotiations –

The Gaza Ministry of Health reported that at least 66 people died in Israeli bombings against the territory in the last 24 hours.

The attacks hit the cities of Khan Yunis and Rafah in the south, as well as Gaza City in the north.

Hopes for a possible new truce coincide with international pressure to dissuade Israel from invading Rafah, a city in the southern Gaza Strip that is home to 1.5 million people, most of them displaced by the war.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said at an economic forum in Saudi Arabia that only the United States government can prevent a military operation of this type, which would be “the biggest disaster in the history of the Palestinian people.”

Abbas spoke at the World Economic Forum (WEF), which began this Sunday in Riyadh, and features the participation of several authorities and mediators in the conflict, such as American Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Despite the absence of Israeli representatives at the event, the forum is an “opportunity to have structured conversations with key figures, said WEF president, Norwegian Børge Brende.

“There is new momentum in talks regarding hostages, and also for… a possible way out of the impasse we face in Gaza,” he added.

– More than 34,000 dead in Gaza –

The war began on October 7, when Hamas militiamen invaded southern Israel and murdered 1,170 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP report based on official Israeli data. They also kidnapped almost 250 people.

Israel’s reprisal offensive left more than 34,450 people dead, most of them women and minors, according to the Gaza Strip’s Ministry of Health.

Israeli authorities estimate that 129 hostages remain in captivity in Gaza, including 34 who died during the war. The November truce allowed the exchange of 80 hostages for 240 Palestinian prisoners.

The Islamist group released a video on Saturday in which two hostages asked the Israeli government to negotiate an agreement that would allow their release.

Shortly afterwards, a crowd gathered in Tel Aviv to demand the release of hostages from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“It’s time to reach an agreement that gets us out of here safe and sound… Keep protesting, so that there is an agreement now,” said Omri Miran, one of the two hostages, in the recording.

In central Gaza, Mohammed al Hattab found his one-year-old son among the rubble, after an Israeli bombing of the Nuseirat refugee camp.

The boy is receiving treatment for a fractured skull, while his two-year-old daughter’s face has been left “disfigured”, he told AFP.

The Israeli army said it had struck dozens of terrorist targets. Israel, like the United States and the European Union, considers Hamas a terrorist organization.

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