An Israeli delegation has visited Qatar after a new Hamas proposal earlier this week raised hopes for a truce deal as fighting continues to rage in Gaza.
Israeli negotiators, led by intelligence chief David Barnea, met with mediators in Doha on Friday, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office. Talks are expected to resume next week, the office said, when another negotiating team will be deployed to Qatar.
The office added that there were still “gaps between party positions.”
The latest development came after Hamas said on Wednesday it had presented new “ideas” to Qatari, Egyptian and Turkish mediators on how to reach a ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal to end the nine-month-old conflict.
At least 38,011 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza, which began after a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7 that killed at least 1,139 people, according to an Tel Aviv Tribune tally based on Israeli statistics.
Details of Hamas’ latest proposal were not immediately known, but a U.S. official said Thursday that it contained a substantial change from the group’s previous position. The official, in a call with reporters, described the update as a “step forward,” while warning that obstacles remained.
On Friday, Hamas spokesman Jihad Taha said the group’s latest proposals “have received a positive response from the mediators,” but added that “the official Israeli position is not yet clear,” according to the Associated Press news agency.
Israel and Hamas are under increasing pressure to reach a deal, but talks around a United Nations-backed plan put forward by U.S. President Joe Biden in May have stalled in recent weeks.
The main sticking point for Hamas is whether Israel will resume fighting after the release of dozens of Israeli prisoners still held by the group. In the meantime, despite repeated US claims that Israel supports the plan, Netanyahu has repeatedly said the war will not end until Hamas is “eradicated.”
In a call with Biden on Thursday, Netanyahu again said the war would only end if Israel “achieved all of its objectives.”
Fighting continues in Gaza
Despite the latest diplomatic wave, fighting continued to rage in Gaza on Friday, with Israeli forces focusing their attacks on the southern towns of Khan Younis and Rafah and northern Gaza City.
At least 10 bodies were taken to Nasser hospital after the attacks on the two southern towns, hospital officials told Tel Aviv Tribune correspondent Tareq Abu Azzoum.
He also reported “incessant” attacks in the Shujayea neighborhood of Gaza City, where he said the Israeli army was “demolishing entire blocks of houses.”
The al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military wing, said its fighters killed 10 Israeli soldiers in an ambush in Shujayea. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the claim.
Tensions remain high on the Lebanese-Israeli border, where intensified fighting between Hezbollah and the Israeli military continues to fuel fears of a wider escalation. The Lebanese group said it targeted several Israeli military positions near the border on Friday.
Hezbollah later said in a statement that leader Hassan Nasrallah met with a Hamas delegation to discuss “latest developments in the negotiations” and “security and political developments” in Gaza and the region.
The fighting in Gaza has uprooted nearly 90 percent of the population, forcing many to live in squalor with limited access to health care or other assistance. Nearly 500,000 people face “catastrophic” famine in the enclave, according to the United Nations.
On Friday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and EU Crisis Management Commissioner Janez Lenarcic warned that the Israeli military’s orders this week for more than 250,000 Palestinians to evacuate eastern Khan Younis would only further deepen the humanitarian catastrophe.
“This evacuation decision will certainly worsen overcrowding and cause severe shortages in the already overwhelmed remaining hospitals, at a time when access to emergency medical care is crucial,” the two men wrote in a joint statement, adding that the forced evacuations create “a humanitarian crisis within the crisis.”
“A ceasefire is all the more important now, as it would allow an influx of humanitarian aid into Gaza as well as the release of all hostages,” they said.
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