A breakthrough in these complex negotiations?
The head of the CIA, the American intelligence service, will meet "in the coming days in Paris" with senior Egyptian, Israeli and Qatari officials to try to conclude an agreement between Israel and Hamas over Gaza, said Friday a security source from a state involved in the negotiations.
This source thus confirmed information from the American daily Washington Post according to which President Joe Biden intends very soon to send William Burns to Europe to try to negotiate the release of the hostages still held in the Gaza Strip in exchange for a truce in the fighting of two month.
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The White House, however, said that an “imminent” announcement on the hostage issue should not be expected.
“We continue to do everything we can to pave the way for a new hostage agreement,” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said at a news conference.
But “we should not expect imminent progress,” he added.
Joe Biden discussed with the Emir of Qatar, Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, and then with the President of Egypt, Abdel-Fattah al-Sissi, the “latest events in Israel and Gaza, including efforts to free the kidnapped hostages by Hamas,” the White House announced on Friday.
1.7 million Palestinians displaced
During the unprecedented attack by the Islamist movement Hamas on Israeli soil on October 7, some 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, according to Israeli authorities.
Around a hundred were released at the end of November during a truce in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
One hundred and thirty-two hostages are still held captive in the Palestinian territory, 28 of whom are believed to have died.
In response, Israel vowed to “annihilate” Hamas, in power in Gaza since 2007, and launched a vast military operation which left 26,083 people dead, the vast majority of them women, children and adolescents, according to the Ministry of Health. of the Islamist movement.
In the territory plunged into a humanitarian disaster, around 1.7 million Palestinians, out of a total of 2.4 million inhabitants, have fled their homes.