Hamas has responded to a US-backed proposal for a Gaza ceasefire and an trade of captives for prisoners with some “remarks” on the plan, Qatari and Egyptian mediators have stated.
Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad (PIJ) group stated in a joint assertion on Tuesday that they had been able to “deal positively to reach at an settlement” and that their precedence is to deliver a “full cease” to Israel’s ongoing assault on Gaza.
Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan advised Lebanon’s Al-Mayadeen tv channel that the group had “submitted some remarks on the proposal to the mediators”. He didn’t give any particulars.
“The Hamas response reaffirmed the group’s stance [that] any settlement should finish the Zionist aggression on our folks, get the Israeli forces out, reconstruct Gaza and obtain a severe prisoners swap deal,” a Hamas official advised Reuters information company.
The international ministries of Qatar and Egypt stated in a joint assertion that they had been inspecting the response and that they’d proceed their mediation efforts together with the USA “till an settlement is reached”.
Qatar and Egypt Announce that they’ve Acquired a response from Hamas and the Palestinian Factions relating to the Truce Proposal #MOFAQatar pic.twitter.com/8hpBTERyJK
— Ministry of International Affairs – Qatar (@MofaQatar_EN) June 11, 2024
White Home Nationwide Safety Spokesperson John Kirby stated the US had additionally acquired and was evaluating the response.
“We’re working our means by way of the Hamas response,” Kirby advised reporters.
Al Jazeera’s Imran Khan reported that Hamas and PIJ leaders stated the response that was delivered consists of amendments.
“The amendments embrace an entire withdrawal from your entire Gaza Strip, together with the Rafah crossing and the Philadelphi Hall,” Khan stated, referring to the important border crossing with Egypt.
“The Israelis need one factor … the destruction of Hamas each politically and militarily,” he stated. “What this proposal suggests is that Hamas could nicely survive indirectly, form, or kind.”
The response comes as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits the Center East looking for to safe settlement for the ceasefire plan and plans for post-war reconstruction and governance in Gaza.
Blinken met Israeli officers on Tuesday in a push to finish the eight-month-old Israeli air and floor offensive that has devastated Gaza, a day after the US-backed proposal for a truce was accredited by the United Nations Safety Council.
‘We’ll consider it solely after we see it’
As a part of his eighth journey to the Center East because the Gaza assault started, Blinken additionally sought steps to forestall months of border clashes between Israel and the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah from escalating right into a full-scale struggle.
On Monday, Blinken had talks in Cairo with President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt, a key mediator within the struggle, in Cairo earlier than continuing to Israel, the place he met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.
Blinken’s consultations in Israel on Tuesday included one with centrist former navy chief Benny Gantz, who resigned from Israel’s struggle cupboard on Sunday over what he stated was Netanyahu’s failure to stipulate a plan for ending the battle.
Blinken, talking later within the day at a convention in Jordan on the humanitarian response for Gaza, introduced $404m in assist for Palestinians and known as on different donors to additionally “step up”.
Egypt’s el-Sisi advised the gathering on the Useless Sea that nations ought to power Israel to cease what he known as using starvation as a weapon and take away obstacles to help distribution in Gaza.
Biden has repeatedly declared that ceasefires had been shut over the previous a number of months, however there was just one, week-long truce, in November, when greater than 100 captives had been freed in trade for about 240 Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
Biden’s proposal envisages a ceasefire and phased launch of captives in trade for Palestinians detained in Israel, in the end resulting in a everlasting finish to the lethal assault.
The US is Israel’s closest ally and largest arms provider however, together with a lot of the world, has turn out to be sharply essential of the massive demise toll in Gaza and the destruction and humanitarian calamity wrought by the Israeli offensive.
Within the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, Palestinians reacted warily to the Safety Council vote, fearing it may show yet one more ceasefire initiative that goes nowhere.
“We’ll consider it solely after we see it,” stated Shaban Abdel-Raouf, 47, from a displaced household of 5 sheltering within the central metropolis of Deir el-Balah, a frequent goal of Israeli firepower.
“After they inform us to pack our belongings and put together to return to Gaza Metropolis, we’ll know it’s true,” he advised Reuters through a chat app.
Additionally Tuesday, the UN human rights workplace stated each Israeli forces and Palestinian armed teams could have dedicated struggle crimes in reference to a lethal raid by Israeli forces that freed 4 hostages and killed at the least 274 Palestinians over the weekend in central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp.
In the meantime, Palestinians stated Israeli forces working within the southern metropolis of Rafah blew up a cluster of properties on Tuesday. An Israeli air strike on a major avenue in Gaza Metropolis additionally killed at the least 4 folks, medics stated.
Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed greater than 37,100 folks, in keeping with Gaza’s Well being Ministry. Palestinians are dealing with widespread starvation and looming famine as a result of Israeli forces have largely minimize off the circulation of meals, drugs and different provides by sealing the borders shut.
UN businesses say multiple million folks in Gaza may expertise the best degree of hunger by mid-July.
Israel launched the offensive after Hamas’s October 7 assault, through which its fighters stormed into southern Israel, killed some 1,139 folks and kidnapped about 250, in keeping with an Al Jazeera tally based mostly on official Israeli statistics.
