GAZA STRIP (Palestinian Territories): Israel launched fresh strikes in the Gaza Strip on Friday after negotiators pursuing a long-stalled truce agreement left talks in Cairo without having secured a deal.
AFP journalists in the Gaza Strip on early Friday witnessed artillery strikes on Rafah on the territory’s southern border with Egypt, while witnesses reported air strikes and fighting in Gaza City further north.
Israeli and Hamas negotiating teams left Cairo on Thursday after what the Egyptian hosts described as a “two-day round” of indirect negotiations on the terms of a Gaza truce, according to Egyptian intelligence-linked Al-Qahera News.
Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip and whose unprecedented October 7 attacks on Israel sparked the war there, said its delegation had left for Qatar, home to the Palestinian Hamas group’s political leadership.
“The negotiating delegation left Cairo heading to Doha. In practice, the occupation (Israel) rejected the proposal submitted by the mediators and raised objections to it on several central issues,” Hamas said in a message to other Palestinian factions, adding it stood by the proposal.
“Accordingly, the ball is now completely in the hands of the occupation.”
Hamas had said on Monday that it had accepted a ceasefire proposal put forward by mediators.
The deal, the group said, involved a withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, the return of Palestinians displaced by the war, and the exchange of hostages held by Hamas for Palestinian prisoners detained in Israel, with the aim of a “permanent ceasefire”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office at the time called the proposal “far from Israel’s essential demands”, but said the government would still send negotiators to Cairo.
Israel has long resisted the idea of a permanent ceasefire, insisting it must finish the job of dismantling Hamas.
Mediator Egypt said the two sides must show “flexibility” in order to strike a deal for a ceasefire and hostage-prisoner exchange in the seven-month war, according to a foreign ministry statement.
All eyes have been on Rafah in recent weeks, where the population has swelled to around 1.5 million after hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled fighting and bombardments in other areas of Gaza in a desperate search for safety.
Countries around the world, including key Israeli backer the United States, have urged Israel not to extend its ground offensive into Rafah, citing fears of a large civilian toll.
Israel insists, however, that in order to achieve its war aims, it must send ground troops into the city, where it claims senior Hamas military leaders are hiding. – AFP
