[🇧🇩] Israel and Hamas war in Gaza-----Can Bangladesh be a peace broker?

[Saif]

Israel takes control of key corridor in southern Gaza

Israel announced on Saturday that its military had completed the takeover of a new corridor in southern Gaza, advancing its efforts to seize large parts of the war-battered Palestinian territory.

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Israel takes control of key corridor in southern Gaza
Agence France-Presse . Gaza 13 April, 2025, 01:15

File photo

Israel announced on Saturday that its military had completed the takeover of a new corridor in southern Gaza, advancing its efforts to seize large parts of the war-battered Palestinian territory.

The announcement from defence minister Israel Katz came as Hamas expected ‘real progress’ towards a ceasefire deal to end the war in Gaza, with senior leaders from the Palestinian movement scheduled to hold talks with Egyptian mediators in Cairo on Saturday.

‘The IDF [military] has now completed its takeover of the Morag axis, which crosses Gaza between Rafah and Khan Yunis, turning the entire area between the Philadelphi Route [along the border with Egypt] and Morag into part of the Israeli security zone,’ Katz said in a statement addressed to residents of Gaza.

‘Soon, IDF [military] operations will intensify and expand to other areas throughout most of Gaza, and you will need to evacuate the combat zones.

‘In northern Gaza as well — in Beit Hanoun and other neighbourhoods — residents are evacuating, the area is being taken over and the security zone is being expanded, including in the Netzarim corridor,’ he added.

Since a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas collapsed in mid-March, Israel’s renewed offensive in Gaza has displaced hundreds of thousands of people while the military has seized large areas of the war-battered territory.

Top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have repeatedly said that the ongoing assault aims to pressure Hamas into freeing the remaining hostages held in Gaza.

Hamas on Saturday said that the offensive not only ‘kills defenceless civilians but also makes the fate of the occupation’s prisoners [hostages] uncertain’.

Katz’s announcements came ahead of a meeting between Hamas and Egyptian mediators in Cairo on Saturday.

The scheduled talks also came days after US President Donald Trump suggested an agreement to secure the release of hostages was close to being finalised.

A Hamas official told AFP that the group anticipated the meeting in Cairo would yield significant progress.

‘We hope the meeting will achieve real progress towards reaching an agreement to end the war, halt the aggression and ensure the full withdrawal of occupation forces from Gaza,’ the official familiar with the ceasefire negotiations said on condition of anonymity, as he was not authorised to speak publicly on the matter.

According to the official, Hamas has not yet received any new ceasefire proposals, despite Israeli media reports suggesting that Israel and Egypt had exchanged draft documents outlining a potential ceasefire and hostage release agreement.

‘However, contacts and discussions with mediators are ongoing,’ he added, accusing Israel of ‘continuing its aggression’ in Gaza.

The Times of Israel reported that Egypt’s proposal would involve the release of eight living hostages and eight bodies, in exchange for a truce lasting between 40 and 70 days and a substantial release of Palestinian prisoners.

President Trump said during a cabinet meeting this week that ‘we’re getting close to getting them [hostages in Gaza] back’.

Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff was also quoted in an Israeli media report as saying ‘a very serious deal is taking shape, it’s a matter of days’.

Since Israel resumed its Gaza strikes, more than 1,500 people have been killed, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory to which Israel cut off aid more than a month ago.

Dozens of these strikes have killed ‘only women and children,’ according to a report by UN human rights office.

The report also warned that expanding Israeli evacuation orders were resulting in the ‘forcible transfer’ of people into ever-shrinking areas, raising ‘real concern as to the future viability of Palestinians as a group in Gaza’.

Gaza’s civil defence agency reported an Israeli air strike on a house in Gaza City on Saturday morning.

AFP footage of the aftermath of the strike showed the bodies of four men, wrapped in white shrouds, at a local hospital, while several individuals gathered to offer prayers before the funeral.

The Israeli military, meanwhile, said its air force intercepted three projectiles that were identified as crossing into Israeli territory from southern Gaza on Saturday.​

 

[Saif]

UK foreign minister urges Israel to stop 'deplorable' Gaza hospital attacks

British foreign minister David Lammy on Sunday urged Israel to stop carrying out "deplorable attacks" on hospitals in Gaza after an Israeli strike on one of the territory's few functioning hospitals.

en.prothomalo.com

UK foreign minister urges Israel to stop 'deplorable' Gaza hospital attacks
AFPLondon, United Kingdom
Updated: 13 Apr 2025, 21: 00

People check the destruction in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on the Al-Ahli hospital, also known as the Baptist or Ahli Arab hospital, in Gaza City on April 13, 2025 AFP

British foreign minister David Lammy on Sunday urged Israel to stop carrying out "deplorable attacks" on hospitals in Gaza after an Israeli strike on one of the territory's few functioning hospitals.

"Al-Ahli Hospital has been attacked repeatedly since the conflict began," Lammy posted on X. "These deplorable attacks must end. Diplomacy not more bloodshed is how we will achieve a lasting peace."​

 

[Saif]

Gaza hospital hit as Israel intensifies assault

An Israeli air strike early Sunday heavily damaged one of the few functioning hospitals in Gaza, with the Israeli military saying it had targeted a Hamas ‘command and control centre’ operating within the facility.

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Gaza hospital hit as Israel intensifies assault
Agence France-Presse . Gaza City, Palestinian Territories 13 April, 2025, 17:11

Palestinian rescuers and residents gather on the rubble after an Israeli strike on the Manoun family home in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on Sunday. | AFP photo

An Israeli air strike early Sunday heavily damaged one of the few functioning hospitals in Gaza, with the Israeli military saying it had targeted a Hamas ‘command and control centre’ operating within the facility.

Since the outbreak of war, tens of thousands of Gazans have sought refuge in hospitals, many of which have suffered severe damage in the on-going hostilities.

The strike on Al-Ahli Hospital in northern Gaza — also known as the Baptist or Ahli Arab Hospital — caused no casualties, but came a day after Israeli forces seized a key corridor in the territory and signalled plans to expand their campaign.

It also came as aid agencies and the United Nations warned that medicines and related supplies were rapidly running out in Gaza as casualties surged.

‘The bombing led to the destruction of the surgery building and the oxygen generation station for the intensive care units,’ Gaza’s civil defence rescue agency said.

It came ‘minutes after the Israeli army’s warning to evacuate’, the agency added.

AFP photographs showed massive slabs of concrete and twisted metal scattered across the site after the strike.

The blast left a gaping hole in one of the hospital’s buildings, with iron doors torn from their hinges. An Iraqi broadcaster said one of its TV vans was also damaged.

A separate air strike Sunday on a vehicle in the central city of Deir el-Balah killed seven people including six brothers, the civil defence agency said.

Mahmud Abu Amsha, who witnessed the strike, said those killed were distributing aid. ‘They do not care about children or people being killed. This aid was being provided to the displaced people,’ he said.

On Saturday, Israeli defence minister Israel Katz announced that the military planned to expand its offensive as it completed the takeover of the ‘Morag axis’ between the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Yunis.

Patients, relatives and medical personnel evacuated the Al-Ahli hospital in haste following the military’s warning.

Many found themselves stranded in the surrounding streets.

Naela Imad, 42, had been sheltering at the hospital but had to rush out of the complex.

‘Just as we reached the hospital gate, they bombed it. It was a massive explosion,’ she said.

‘Now, me and my children are out on the street. We’ve been displaced more than 20 times. The hospital was our last refuge.’

The Israeli military asserted that Hamas militants were operating ‘a command and control centre’ inside the hospital compound.

Hamas condemned what it described as a ‘savage crime’ committed by Israel ‘with blatant US cover and complicity’, dismissing the claim that the facility was a used militarily.

Qatar, which helped mediate a fragile ceasefire between the warring parties that fell apart last month, also denounced the strike as ‘a heinous crime’.

Hospitals, protected under international humanitarian law, have repeatedly been hit by Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas on October 7, 2023.

Al-Ahli was heavily damaged by an explosion in its car park on October 17, 2023 that caused multiple fatalities.

Aid agencies and the UN say that only a few of Gaza’s 36 hospitals remain partially functional.

British foreign secretary David Lammy urged Israel on Sunday to halt the ‘deplorable attacks’ on hospitals, calling for diplomacy to ‘achieve a lasting peace’.

Last month, Israeli forces opened fire on ambulances in Gaza, killing 15 medics and rescuers in an incident that sparked international condemnation.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said Sunday that a medic who had been missing since the attack, Asaad al-Nsasrah, was being held by Israeli authorities.

‘His fate had remained unknown since he was targeted along with other PRCS medics in Rafah,’ the group said in a statement.

The Israeli army has said it is investigating the attack.

The Gaza war broke out after Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Gaza’s health ministry said Sunday that at least 1,574 Palestinians had been killed since March 18 when the ceasefire collapsed, taking the overall death toll since the war began to 50,944.

The ceasefire had largely put a halt to the fighting in Gaza for two months, but Israel restarted intense strikes in mid-March, with Palestinian militants resuming rocket fire from the territory days later.

The Israeli military said Sunday that ‘one projectile that was identified crossing into Israeli territory from Gaza was intercepted’ by the air force, with no injuries reported.​

 

[Saif]

https://thefinancialexpress.com.bd/world/eu-to-boost-financial-support-for-palestinian-authority

EU to boost financial support for Palestinian Authority
REUTERS
Published :
Apr 14, 2025 21:07
Updated :
Apr 14, 2025 21:07

European Commissioner for Mediterranean Dubravka Suica speaks to the media in Brussels, Belgium March 17, 2025. Photo : REUTERS/Yves Herman/Files

The European Union will increase its financial support for the Palestinian Authority with a three-year package worth around 1.6 billion euros ($1.8 billion), the European Commissioner responsible for the Middle East told Reuters in an interview.

Dubravka Suica, the European Commissioner for the Mediterranean, said the financial support would go hand in hand with reforms of the Palestinian Authority, which has been accused by critics of corruption and bad governance.

"We want them to reform themselves because without reforming, they won't be strong enough and credible in order to be an interlocutor, not for only for us, but an interlocutor also for Israel," Suica said.

The commissioner's remarks came ahead of a first "high-level political dialogue" between European Union foreign ministers and senior Palestinian officials including Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa in Luxembourg on Monday.

The EU is the biggest donor to the Palestinians and EU officials hope the Palestinian Authority, which runs the West Bank, may also one day take responsibility for Gaza after the war between Israel and Hamas militants comes to an end.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, however, has so far rejected the idea of handing over Gaza to the PA and shunned the EU's broader aim of a two-state solution, which would include the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Suica said 620 million euros would go to financial support and reform of the PA, 576 million euros to "resilience and recovery" of the West Bank and Gaza and 400 million euros would come in loans from the European Investment Bank, subject to the approval of its governing body.

She said average EU support for the PA had amounted to about 400 million euros over the past 12 years.

"We are investing now in a credible manner in the Palestinian Authority," Suica said.​

 

[Saif]

Much for world, Bangladesh to do to stop Gaza genocide

THE wave of protests taking place as elsewhere around the world as in Bangladesh in solidarity with Palestine, demanding an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza and condemning US complicity in an expanding offensive in the Palestinian city, that too, in violation of a ceasefire is something that...

www.newagebd.net

Much for world, Bangladesh to do to stop Gaza genocide
14 April, 2025, 00:00

THE wave of protests taking place as elsewhere around the world as in Bangladesh in solidarity with Palestine, demanding an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza and condemning US complicity in an expanding offensive in the Palestinian city, that too, in violation of a ceasefire is something that Israel and the United States should heed for them to act and the world community for it to make Israel and the United States act to end the Israeli brutality. When the roads of the world are swarming with protesters rising up against the Israeli offensive, tens of thousands of Bangladeshis — political leaders, professionals, students and ordinary people — on April 12 marched down the roads in the capital, carrying Bangladeshi and Palestinian flags, banners and festoons mostly reading ‘Free Palestine’ and ‘Save Gaza’ and carried symbolic dead bodies to Suhrawardy Udyan, where political parties, civil groups and Islamic scholars gathered under the banner of the Palestine Solidarity Movement. They demanded an end to the Israeli attacks on Gaza and the foundation of an independent Palestine. Official Palestinian figures put the death toll in Gaza at more than 61,700 since October 7, 2023.

But the protests held in Suhrawardy Udyan on April 12 where a declaration outlined the demands for the United Nations, the world community and Muslim world leaders, especially Arab nations, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and the Bangladesh government appear hardly critical of the United States. Israel’s genocide in Gaza has, of course, resulted from the nonchalance of the Muslim world, especially Arab nations. But it could not happen without the complicity of the United States. Before the Balfour declaration was made public, it was approved by the United States in early 1918. The west, generally, and the United States, especially, having ignored the historical context has given rise to the current state of the conflict.

The United States, the first country to grant Israel recognition on May 14, 1948, engineered the Oslo accord and the Abraham accord to further consolidate Israel as the colonial settler state in occupied Palestine with support from major Arab states. The Arab world and the United States are both equally responsible for the current state of Palestine and they all should be equally condemned. It is time political leaders and forces in Bangladesh acted in equally condemning Israel and the United States for the genocide and also calling out the United States on doing enough.

The world leaders and the Arab nations should, therefore, rise up to force Israel and the United States to stop genocide in Gaza and effect a sustainable solution to the problems. Political leaders and forces in Bangladesh should also realise that it is no time for them to mince words about the United States when it comes to injustice inflicted on Palestine.​

 

[Saif]

Israel is about to empty Gaza

ISRAEL is poised to carry out the largest campaign of ethnic cleansing since the end of World War II. Since March 2, it has blocked all food and humanitarian aid into Gaza and cut off electricity, so that the last water desalination plant no longer functions. The Israeli military has seized half...

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Israel is about to empty Gaza
Chris Hedges 14 April, 2025, 00:00

| Scheer Post/Mr Fish

ISRAEL is poised to carry out the largest campaign of ethnic cleansing since the end of World War II. Since March 2, it has blocked all food and humanitarian aid into Gaza and cut off electricity, so that the last water desalination plant no longer functions. The Israeli military has seized half of the territory — Gaza is 25 miles long and four to five miles wide — and placed two-thirds of Gaza under displacement orders, rendered ‘no-go zones,’ including the border town of Rafah, which is encircled by Israeli troops.

On Friday Defence Minister Israel Katz announced that Israel will ‘intensify’ the war against Hamas and use ‘all military and civilian pressure, including evacuation of the Gaza population south and implementing United States President [Donald] Trump’s voluntary migration plan for Gaza residents.’

Since Israel’s unilateral ending of the ceasefire on March 18 — which was never honoured by Israel — Israel has been carrying out relentless bombing and shelling against civilians, killing over 1,400 Palestinians and wounding over 3,600, according to the Palestinian health ministry. An average of one hundred children are being killed daily according to the United Nations. Israel is, at the same time, inciting tensions with Egypt to lay what I suspect will be the groundwork for a mass expulsion of Palestinians into the Egyptian Sinai.

Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, echoing Katz, said Israel would not lift the total blockade until Hamas was ‘defeated’ and the remaining 59 Israeli hostages were released.

‘Not even a grain of wheat will enter Gaza,’ he vowed.

But no one in Israel or Gaza expects Hamas, which has weathered the decimation of Gaza and sustained mass slaughter, to surrender or disappear.

The question no longer is will the Palestinians be deported from Gaza but when they will be pushed out and where they will go. The Israeli leadership is apparently torn between driving Palestinians over the border into Egypt or shipping them to countries in Africa. The US and Israel have contacted three East African governments — Sudan, Somalia and the breakaway region of Somalia known as Somaliland — to discuss the resettlement of ethnically cleansed Palestinians.

The consequences of wholesale ethnic cleansing will be catastrophic, jeopardising the stability of the Arab regimes allied with Washington and setting off firestorms of protests within Arab countries. It will likely mean the severing of diplomatic relations between Israel and its neighbours Jordan and Egypt, already close to the breaking point, and push the region closer to war.

Diplomatic relations have fallen to their lowest point since the signing of the Camp David Accords in 1979. The Israeli embassies in Cairo and Amman are largely empty with Israeli staff withdrawn over security concerns following the October 7 incursion into Israel by Hamas and other armed Palestinian factions. Egypt has refused to accept the credentials of Uri Rothman, who was appointed to be the Israeli ambassador last September. Egypt did not name a new ambassador to Israel when former ambassador, Khaled Azmi, was recalled last year.

Israeli officials are accusing Egypt of violating the Camp David accords by increasing its military presence and building new military installations in the Northern Sinai, charges Egypt says are fabricated. The peace treaty’s annex permits additional Egyptian military hardware in the Sinai.

Former Israeli chief of the general staff, Herzi Halevi, warned of what he calls Egypt’s ‘security threat.’ Katz said that Israel would not allow Egypt to ‘violate the peace treaty’ between the two countries signed in 1979.

Egyptian officials note that it is Israel that has violated the treaty by occupying the Philadelphi Corridor, also known as the Salahuddin Axis, which runs along the nine mile border between Gaza and Egypt and is supposed to be demilitarised.

‘Every Israeli action along Gaza’s border with Egypt constitutes hostile behaviour against Egypt’s national security,’ Egyptian General Mohammed Rashad, a former military intelligence chief, told the Arabic language newspaper, Asharq Al-Awsat.

‘Egypt cannot sit idly by in the face of such threats and must prepare for all possible scenarios.’

Israeli officials are openly calling for the ‘voluntary transfer’ of Palestinians to Egypt. Knesset member, Avigdor Lieberman, stated that ‘displacing most Palestinians from Gaza to the Egyptian Sinai is a practical and effective solution.’ He contrasted the high population density — Gaza is one of the most densely populated places on the planet — with the vast ‘untapped lands’ in the Egyptian Northern Sinai and noted that Palestinians share a common culture and language with Egypt, making any deportation ‘natural.’ He also criticised Egypt because it allegedly ‘benefits economically from the current political situation,’ as a mediator between Israel and Hamas and ‘reaps profits from smuggling operations through the tunnels and the Rafah crossing.’

The Israeli think tank Misgav Institute for National Security, staffed by former Israeli military and security officials, published a paper on October 17, 2023, calling on the government to take advantage of the ‘unique and rare opportunity to evacuate the entire Gaza Strip,’ and resettle Palestinians in Cairo with the assistance of the Egyptian government. A leaked document from the Israeli intelligence ministry proposed resettling Palestinians from Gaza to the Northern Sinai and constructing barriers and buffer zones to prevent their return.

Any expulsion would likely happen swiftly with Israeli forces, which are already mercilessly herding Palestinians into containment areas in Gaza, carrying out a sustained bombing campaign against the trapped Palestinians while creating porous evacuation portals along the border with Egypt. It would entail a potentially lethal standoff with the Egyptian military, instantly throwing the Egyptian regime of Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who has described any ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in Gaza as a ‘red line,’ into crisis. It would be a short step from there to a regional conflict.

Israel has seized territory in Syria and southern Lebanon, part of its vision of ‘Greater Israel,’ which includes occupying land in Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. It covets the maritime gas fields off Gaza’s coast and has floated plans for a new canal to bypass the Suez Canal, to connect Israel’s bankrupt Eilat Port on the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. These projects require emptying Gaza of Palestinians and populating it with Jewish colonists.

The anger on the Arab street — an anger I witnessed over the past few months during visits to Egypt, Jordan, the West Bank and Qatar — will explode in a justifiable fury if mass deportation takes place. These regimes, simply to hold on to power, will be forced to act. Terrorist attacks, whether by organised groups or lone wolves, will proliferate against Israeli and western targets, especially the United States.

The genocide is a recruitment dream for Islamic militants. Washington and Israel must, on some level, understand the cost of this savagery. But it appears as though they accept it, foolishly trying to obliterate those they have cast out of the community of nations, those they refer to as ‘human animals.’

What do Israel and Washington believe will happen when the Palestinians are expelled from a land they have lived in for centuries? How do they think a people who are desperate, deprived of hope, dignity and a way to make a living, who are being butchered by one of the most technologically advanced armies on the planet, will respond? Do they think creating a Danteesque hell for the Palestinians will blunt terrorism, curb suicide attacks and foster peace? Can they not grasp the rage rippling through the Middle East and how it will implant a hatred towards us that will endure for decades?

The genocide in Gaza is the greatest crime of this century. It will come back to haunt Israel. It will come back to haunt us. It will usher to our doorsteps the evil we have perpetrated on the Palestinians.

You reap what you sow. We have sown a minefield of hatred and violence.

ScheerPost.com, April 13. Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report.​

 

[Saif]

Hamas says will free hostages if end to Gaza war guaranteed

A senior Hamas official said on Monday that the Palestinian group is prepared to release all Israeli hostages in exchange for a ‘serious prisoner swap’ and guarantees that Israel will end the war in Gaza...

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Hamas says will free hostages if end to Gaza war guaranteed
Agence France-Presse . Cairo, Egypt 14 April, 2025, 19:29

Libyans carry a poster showing slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar (R) during a demonstration in solidarity with the Palestinian people, on April 8, 2025 in Tripoli. | AFP photo.

A senior Hamas official said on Monday that the Palestinian group is prepared to release all Israeli hostages in exchange for a ‘serious prisoner swap’ and guarantees that Israel will end the war in Gaza.

Hamas left Cairo on Monday after negotiations with mediators from Egypt and Qatar — two nations working alongside the United States to broker a ceasefire in the besieged territory.

‘We are ready to release all Israeli captives in exchange for a serious prisoner swap deal, an end to the war, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and the entry of humanitarian aid,’ Taher al-Nunu, a senior Hamas official, told AFP.

However, he accused Israel of obstructing progress towards a ceasefire.

‘The issue is not the number of captives,’ Nunu said, ‘but rather that the occupation is reneging on its commitments, blocking the implementation of the ceasefire agreement and continuing the war’.

‘Hamas has therefore stressed the need for guarantees to compel the occupation (Israel) to uphold the agreement,’ he added.

Israeli news website Ynet reported on Monday that a new proposal had been put to Hamas.

Under the deal, the group would release 10 living hostages in exchange for US guarantees that Israel would enter negotiations for a second phase of the ceasefire.

The first phase of the ceasefire, which began on January 19 and included multiple hostage-prisoner exchanges, lasted two months before disintegrating.

Efforts towards a new truce have stalled, reportedly over disputes regarding the number of hostages to be released by Hamas, with 58 people still held in the Palestinian territory.

Pointing to those failed negotiations, Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it was against talks aimed at phased hostage releases.

‘The phases method wastes valuable time and jeopardises all of the hostages’, the group representing relatives of hostages said.

‘We demand to choose the necessary, feasible and appropriate solution: ending the war and returning all the hostages together, in one immediate phase.’

Meanwhile, Nunu said that Hamas would not disarm, a key condition that Israel has set for ending the war.

‘The weapons of the resistance are not up for negotiation,’ Nunu said.

The war in Gaza broke out after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel. The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Militants also took 251 hostages, 58 of whom are still held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

Gaza’s health ministry said on Sunday that at least 1,613 Palestinians had been killed since March 18, when the ceasefire collapsed, taking the overall death toll since the war began to 50,983.​

 

[Saif]

Israel makes new Gaza truce proposal

Mediators Egypt and Qatar have presented a new Israeli proposal for a Gaza ceasefire to Hamas, Egyptian state-affiliated Al Qahera News TV said.

www.thedailystar.net

Israel makes new Gaza truce proposal
Hamas likely to respond within 48 hrs; Maldives ban Israelis to protest offensive

Mediators Egypt and Qatar have presented a new Israeli proposal for a Gaza ceasefire to Hamas, Egyptian state-affiliated Al Qahera News TV said.

A senior Hamas official told AFP yesterday that the Palestinian movement will "most likely" respond to the ceasefire proposal it received through mediators within 48 hours.

The group reiterated its core demand that a ceasefire deal must end the offensive in Gaza and achieve a full Israeli pull-out from the strip.

Earlier, senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters that the proposal did not meet the Palestinian group's demand that Israel commit to a complete halt of hostilities.

In the proposal, Israel also for the first time called for the disarmament of Hamas in the next phase of negotiations, which the group will not agree to, Abu Zuhri said.

UN chief 'deeply alarmed' by Israeli strike on Gaza hospital

"Handing over the resistance's weapons is a million red lines and is not subject to consideration, let alone discussion", Abu Zuhri said.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is "deeply alarmed" at Sunday's strike by Israeli forces on the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza, his spokesperson said yesterday.

"Under international humanitarian law, wounded and sick, medical personnel and medical facilities, including hospitals, must be respected and protected," the UN chief's spokesperson said.

In a separate development, The Maldives announced yesterday it was banning the entry of Israelis from the luxury tourist archipelago in "resolute solidarity" with the Palestinian people.

President Mohamed Muizzu ratified the legislation shortly after it was approved by parliament yesterday.

The ban will be implemented with immediate effect, a spokesman for Muizzu's office told AFP.​