Middle East War: Still No Truce Agreement, But Hostages Freed ?

While a ceasefire agreement the fire was accepted by Israel but not by Hamas, negotiations continue. Talks on the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza begin ;also.

The essential

• New negotiations to secure the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza began in Cairo on Friday, August 23, according to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman to AFP.
• But negotiations regarding the truce agreement proposed by Washington are not moving forward. While the compromise plan was accepted by Israel, Anthony Blinken called on Hamas to do the same, to no avail. “Time is running out” to end the ten-month-old war between Israel and Hamas, according to the head of American diplomacy.
• Hamas has said it is “willing” to reach a ceasefire but under the terms of a deal proposed in May and would oppose one measure included in the new truce agreement: the one concerning Israel's presence in a corridor to the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

Latest news

16:13 – Iran could give up attacking Israel

Since the death of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Iranian soil on July 31, Tehran has been threatening to strike Israel violently. But this week, Iranian officials announced that this attack may not take place after all, so as not to harm ceasefire negotiations between the Hebrew state and Hamas. A statement released by Iran on Wednesday indicated that a response to Israel's strike on Tehran last month was, in fact, supposed to be “carefully calibrated”.

15:36 – Air traffic in the Middle East remains disrupted

Due to the risk of an escalation of the conflict in the Middle East, the German airline group has announced that it will extend its flights to Beirut, where Israel and Hezbollah are intensifying their attacks. Lufthansa is also extending this suspension of flights to Tel Aviv and Tehran but only until Monday, September 2. Flights to Amman, Jordan and Erbil, Iraq will resume on Tuesday, August 27.

14:45 – Six hostage bodies found by the Israeli army

On Tuesday, August 20, the Israeli army announced that it had found the bodies of six men held hostage by Hamas since October 7 in southern Gaza. According to their latest information, the bodies of the six victims were riddled with bullets. The military operation carried out at the beginning of the week was made possible by information gathered by the army in recent weeks. Nadav Shoshani, the spokesman for the Israeli army, said that Hamas had hidden the bodies behind a fake wall. According to the army, the lifeless bodies of four Hamas members were found alongside the six hostage bodies. The six men, aged 35 to 80 years have been identified and buried in Israel.

12:05 – New negotiations on the release of hostages

According to the statement of the spokesman for the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, at AFP,   New negotiations on an agreement for the release of hostages held in Gaza began this Friday, August 23, between the heads of the Israeli intelligence services and Hamas. The talks are being held in Cairo.