An Israeli delegation is in Paris on Saturday to try to unblock talks on a truce with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, where more than 100 Palestinians were killed overnight according to local authorities.
While the conflict shows no sign of respite twenty weeks after its outbreak, the “
post-war
” plan in Gaza presented by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been widely criticized, including by the American ally.
The humanitarian situation continues to worsen in the Palestinian territory where the humanitarian aid coordination office (Ocha) warned on Saturday of “
a threat of mass famine
” due to lack of sufficient supplies of water and food.
Israeli military operations left at least 103 dead overnight, the Hamas Health Ministry announced on Saturday.
Le Figaro
takes stock of the latest events linked to the conflict.
Washington destroys three Houthi drones in the Red Sea and seven anti-ship missiles
The American armed forces announced that they had shot down three attack drones from Yemen's Houthi rebels in the Red Sea on Friday and destroyed seven anti-ship missiles positioned on land.
Yemeni rebels, supported by Iran, have continued to target maritime traffic in this essential global trade corridor since November, despite the American military response.
Early Friday, the Americans “shot down three explosive attack drones near several merchant ships sailing in the Red Sea.
There was no damage to the ships,” the United States Middle East Military Command (Centcom) wrote in a statement.
Centcom later reported that US forces had destroyed "seven Iranian-backed Houthi mobile anti-ship cruise missiles that were ready for launch toward the Red Sea."
The head of Mossad in Paris
A delegation led by the head of Mossad (Israeli foreign intelligence), David Barnea, arrived in Paris the day before in the hope of “
unblocking
” the talks for a new truce, according to an Israeli official.
Mr. Barnea met his American and Egyptian counterparts and the Prime Minister of Qatar in Paris at the end of January to discuss a new agreement.
According to a Hamas source, the plan then provided for a six-week pause in the fighting and the release of 200 to 300 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for 35 to 40 hostages held by Hamas.
Talks also took place this week in Egypt.
According to Israel, 130 hostages - 30 of whom are believed to have died - are still being held among the approximately 250 people kidnapped in Israel and taken to Gaza on October 7.
That day, Hamas commandos infiltrated from Palestinian territory carried out an attack in southern Israel, killing 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.
Lula persists and signs
Visiting Argentina, American Secretary of State Antony Blinken reaffirmed his country's opposition to any “Israeli reoccupation” of Gaza.
In Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights denounced in a report on Friday “the gross violations” of human rights in Gaza “by all parties” since the start of the war.
For his part, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who recently triggered a diplomatic crisis by comparing the Israeli offensive to the Holocaust, persisted on Friday by accusing Israel of "genocide."