The United States
announced an initial "understanding" with Israel on a truce plan
with the Islamist movement Hamas in the Gaza Strip, from whose northern part hundreds of Palestinians fled today driven by hunger and renewed fighting.
Jake Sullivan, US President Joe Biden's top national security adviser, confirmed that
the plan involves a "temporary" ceasefire between Israel and Hamas
and the release of hostages held in Gaza by the Palestinian Islamist group.
The official told CNN that
Israel had agreed to the general framework of the proposal
, which was presented to it by the United States, Qatar and Egypt last week in Paris, but that its details were still under discussion.
He added that the initiative must now be presented to Hamas by Egypt and Qatar.
Israel's war cabinet discussed the proposal last night,
and Israeli media said today that it gave its tacit approval and would send a delegation to Qatar to continue talks.
However, there was no official confirmation.
Good news
"That work is underway. And we hope that in the coming days we can get to a point where there is in fact a firm and final agreement on the issue," said Sullivan, the White House national security adviser.
Hamas says it has not yet participated in negotiations
on this particular latest proposal, which was discussed Friday in the French capital by the mediating countries and an Israeli delegation led by the country's intelligence chief.
However, the points that according to media from Israel, Egypt and Qatar the proposal includes coincide with previous demands made by Hamas regarding
what would be the first phase of a truce.
According to these media, the plan contemplates a six-week truce in Gaza and
the release of between 200 and 300 Palestinian prisoners
in exchange for between 35 and 40 Israeli hostages.
Menashe Ram, father of Omri Ram, and Orna Adar, mother of Gili Adar, both killed during the October 7 Hamas attack from Gaza.
Reuters Photo
Hamas's top leader, Ismail Haniyeh, was in Cairo, Egypt's capital, last week, before the United States, Egypt and Qatar presented the new plan to Israel in the French capital.
Meanwhile, Israel is developing plans to expand its offensive to Rafah,
Gaza's southernmost city on the border with Egypt, where more than half of the territory's population of 2.3 million has sought refuge.
The U.N. and humanitarian organizations have warned of a catastrophe if Israel launches a ground attack on Rafah, the only Gaza city it has not yet invaded, and the United States and other allies of Israel have said it must avoid harming civilians.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he will convene the Cabinet this week to
"approve operational plans for action in Rafah
," including the evacuation of Palestinian civilians.
Fighting and bombing
After more than four months of hostilities, heavy fighting resumed last week in parts of the northern Gaza Strip, the first target of the offensive, where the magnitude of the destruction is immense.
Residents and Hamas have reported days of intense fighting in the Zeitun neighborhood of northern Gaza City.
Last week, Israel ordered the evacuation of that and another neighborhood of the city.
A large part of the population had already fled from that area
, which has been isolated from the rest of the territory since the start of the war, after receiving evacuation orders from the Israeli Army in October, when the offensive began.
Israeli soldiers carry the coffin of Sergeant Narya Belete during his funeral in Netanya, Israel, Sunday, Feb. 25, 2024. AP Photo
But this time it is above all the lack of food that forces Gazans to flee to the center and south in search of food, after the UN World Food Program (WFP) suspended aid distribution in the north. last week.
Hundreds of Palestinians left their homes in areas of northern Gaza to head to other parts of the Hamas-ruled territory, the AFP news agency reported.
"I came walking (...)
I have no words to describe the type of famine that is spreading there
(...)", said Palestinian Samir Abd Rabbo, 27, who arrived in Nuseirat, in central Gaza, with his one and a half year old daughter.
"There is no milk [for my daughter]. I try to give her bread that I prepare from fodder, but she cannot digest it (...) our only hope is God's help," she told AFP.
Clashes continued last night also in the southern Khan Yunis
, which is located a few kilometers from Rafah and has been the epicenter of the offensive in the last month.
The war broke out on October 7, when Hamas militiamen infiltrated into southern Israel from Gaza killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped about 240, including about twenty Argentines.
Hamas,
a terrorist group that seeks the destruction of Israel
, said it launched its attack in retaliation for decades of Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and east Jerusalem and years of blockade of Gaza.
In response to the attack, Israel launched an air and ground offensive in Gaza that has already left 29,692 Palestinians dead and more than 69,800 injured, the vast majority of them civilians, according to the local Ministry of Health.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, denounced last week the
"blockade and siege imposed on Gaza"
by Israel and suggested that "the use of famine as a method of war" could be a "crime of war".
In Israel, the military reported that two more soldiers were killed in fighting in Gaza, bringing the total to 240.
After an exchange that took place in November, Israeli authorities
estimate that there are still 130 hostages in Gaza, of which 30 have died.
Hamas demands a "complete ceasefire" and a withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, something that Netanyahu, who has promised to fight until achieving "complete victory," rejects.
The premier, however, is under intense internal pressure to bring the hostages home.
Last night, Israeli police had to use water cannons to disperse protesters in Tel Aviv who were demanding an agreement to free the hostages, and 18 people were arrested, authorities reported.
There were also protests in Jerusalem.
Source: EFE and Télam
P.B.