No respite in Gaza war, hopes of a quick truce fade

Photo: Omar Al-Qattaa Agence France-Presse Palestinian children carry pots of soup near a food distribution point in the Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, on August 21, 2024.

Agence France-Presse in the Gaza Strip

Published yesterday at 12:41 Updated yesterday at 16:57

• Middle East

Israeli negotiators are taking part in talks in Cairo on Thursday aimed at securing a truce in the Gaza Strip and the release of hostages, as the war between Israel and Hamas continues in the Palestinian territory.

The negotiations come a week after talks in Doha between American, Qatari and Egyptian mediators and the heads of Mossad (Israeli foreign intelligence), David Barnea, and Shin Bet (internal security), Ronen Bar.

Barnea and Bar are currently in Cairo, where they are “negotiating to advance an agreement to [free] the hostages,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman Omer Dostri told AFP on Thursday evening. He did not specify who was also present at the talks, but Israeli media reports say the Americans are in Cairo.

The hostages were kidnapped and taken to Gaza in an unprecedented attack by the Islamist movement Hamas on October 7 on Israeli soil that sparked war in the devastated and besieged Palestinian territory.

The new negotiations come after a Middle East tour by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that failed to produce a breakthrough, and a phone call on Wednesday between Mr Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden that “stressed the urgency of finalising an agreement on a ceasefire and the release of the hostages.”

During the negotiations in Doha, Washington announced a compromise proposal for a truce, the content of which has not been made public.

Mr. Blinken said Netanyahu had accepted it and called on Hamas to do the same.

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“Philadelphia Corridor”

But the Israeli authorities have not yet publicly announced that they have approved the American proposal and Hamas has rejected it, accusing the United States of having included “Israeli conditions” in it, particularly on the “Philadelphia Corridor”.

The differences of opinion concern in particular this corridor, a strip of land between the border between Gaza and Egypt, currently controlled by Israeli troops.

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Mr. Netanyahu is inflexible on the question of maintaining Israeli troops in this area.

“The prime minister stands by the principle that Israel must control the Philadelphia corridor in order to prevent Hamas from rearming itself and allowing it to repeat the horrors of October 7,” Netanyahu’s office said on Thursday.

As he left the Middle East on Wednesday, Blinken stressed U.S. opposition to a “long-term Israeli occupation of Gaza.”

Hamas is insisting on implementing, as is, a plan announced by Joe Biden on May 31, which it had accepted. It provides for a six-week truce accompanied by an Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas of Gaza and the release of hostages, then, in a second phase, a total Israeli withdrawal from the territory.

Bullets in the bodies of hostages

For the United States, a ceasefire in Gaza would help avoid a military escalation in the Middle East, after threats from Iran and its allies – Hamas, Lebanese Hezbollah – to retaliate for the assassination, attributed to Israel, of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in late July in Tehran.

On October 7, Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza into southern Israel carried out an attack that resulted in the death of 1,199 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.

Of the 251 people kidnapped that day, 105 are still being held in Gaza, including 34 declared dead by The Israeli army said Thursday it had found bullets in the bodies of six hostages it recently rescued from a tunnel in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, adding that it was investigating the circumstances of their deaths.

“We live in fear”

Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas, which seized power in Gaza in 2007 and which it considers a terrorist organization, along with the United States and the European Union.

Its army launched a major offensive in response to the October 7 attack that left at least 40,265 dead, according to the Hamas government's health ministry, which did not provide details on the number of civilians and fighters killed. According to the UN, most of the dead were women and minors.

In the Gaza Strip, where the approximately 2.4 million inhabitants are facing a humanitarian disaster, the Civil Defense reported that five Palestinians were killed in an Israeli strike that hit their home in Khan Younis (south).

Witnesses also reported clashes between the army and Palestinian fighters in the north, as well as Israeli strikes in the center.

After an Israeli bombardment, a dense cloud of black smoke covered the Nousseirat refugee camp (center), where residents fled in haste, crossing dust and debris, according to images from AFPTV.

“We live in fear with our children, the bombardments never stop,” Tahani Abou Cherbi told AFP in the region near Deir al-Balah, who refuses to move again “despite the danger.”