Mediators to the Gaza War cease-fire talks said Friday the two-day talks wrapped up and they aim to reconvene in Cairo next week to seal a deal to stop the fighting.
In a statement Friday, the United States, Egypt and Qatar said talks were constructive and conducted in a positive atmosphere. They presented both parties with a proposal and hope to continue working on the details of the implementation in the coming days.
The new round of talks began Thursday and were aimed at halting the 10-month war and securing the release of scores of hostages, with a potential deal seen as the best hope of heading off an even larger regional conflict. Hamas, which didn’t participate directly in the talks, accuses Israel of adding new demands to a previous proposal that had U.S. and international support and to which Hamas had agreed in principle.
Both sides have agreed in principle to the plan President Joe Biden announced on May 31. But Hamas has proposed amendments and Israel has suggested clarifications, leading each side to accuse the other of trying to tank a deal.
Hamas has rejected Israel’s demands, which include a lasting military presence along the border with Egypt and a line bisecting Gaza where it would search Palestinians returning to their homes to root out militants.
On Friday mediators said it presented a bridging proposal to both parties consistent with the plan laid out by Biden. This proposal builds on areas of agreement and bridges remaining gaps, that allow for a swift implementation of the deal.
The new push for an end to the Israel-Hamas war came as the Palestinian death toll in Gaza climbed past 40,000, according to Gaza health authorities, and fears remained high that Iran and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon would attack Israel in retaliation for the killings of top militant leaders.
International mediators believe the best hope for calming tensions would be a deal between Israel and Hamas to halt the fighting and secure the release of Israeli hostages.
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DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — The Israeli military on Friday dropped leaflets asking civilians to evacuate from areas in northern Khan Younis and eastern Deir al-Balah, saying forces plan to respond to rocket fire that targeted Israel.
New evacuation orders are targeting areas that were previously designated as humanitarian zones, including al-Qarara, Muwasi, al-Galaa, Hamd City, and al-Nasr.
"Due to significant acts of terrorism, the exploitation of the Humanitarian Area for terrorist activities, and the firing of rockets and mortars toward the State of Israel in the north of Khan Yunis, remaining in this area has become dangerous. Therefore, at this time the Humanitarian Area will be adjusted,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on social media.
The IDF said that it asked resident to evacuate by rolling out flyers, SMS messages, phone calls, Arabic broadcasts, and recorded voice messages.
“Once again, fear spreads as families have nowhere to go. People remain trapped in an endless nightmare of death and destruction on a staggering scale,” said the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees of the new evacuation orders.
Earlier this month, the IDF ordered a mass evacuation in large areas around Khan Younis, Gaza’s second largest city that has previously suffered widespread destruction during air and ground operations earlier this year.
Israeli forces have repeatedly returned to heavily destroyed areas of Gaza where they launched operations against Hamas and other militants since the start of the 10-month-old war.
BEIRUT -- Egypt’s foreign minister said Friday that an immediate cease-fire in the Gaza Strip is needed to stop an escalation that could push the region into a wider war.
Badr Abdelaty’s comments in Beirut came as officials from Egypt, Qatar, Israel and the U.S. were holding talks in the Qatari capital of Doha in an attempt to end the war in Gaza.
“We confirm the importance of stopping the escalation and that the region does not slide to a comprehensive regional war,” Abdelaty told reporters after meeting with Lebanese Parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a key ally of Hezbollah.
“Egypt is exerting all possible efforts, as you know, to stop the escalation and to work to reach as much as possible an immediate cease-fire in the Gaza Strip,” Abdelaty said.
He said the details of the cease-fire deal are known but there must be a will to reach this deal in what “leads to a cease-fire and the release of all (Israeli) hostages and Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.”
Abdelaty said Egypt insists on the reactivation of the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip that was captured by Israeli troops in early May. He also said that Egypt wants Israel to withdraw from the strategic Philadelphi Corridor.
Tension has been rising in the Middle East following the killing of a top military official of the militant Hezbollah group in Beirut and of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. Iran and Hezbollah blamed Israel for Haniyeh’s death and have vowed to retaliate.
BEIRUT — Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group released a video Friday showing an underground tunnel in which trucks were carrying long-range missiles.
The release of the video, with English and Hebrew subtitles, comes as Hezbollah has vowed to retaliate for a July 30 Israeli airstrike in Beirut that killed the group’s top military commander, Fouad Shukur.
The release also comes as officials from Qatar, Egypt, Israel and the U.S. are holding talks in Qatar in another attempt to reach a deal to end the war in the Gaza Strip.
The video showed what it said is a storage place where several trucks, each carrying six missiles, were driving through a tunnel to a place where an overhead metal gate opened, appearing to show that they were ready to be fired.
Hezbollah has tens of thousands of rockets and missiles of different types and ranges that it says can hit anywhere in Israel. It also has used military drones in recent months.
Hezbollah started attacking Israeli military posts on Oct. 8, a day after a Hamas-led attack on Israel triggered the war in Gaza. The group says it will only stop when Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip ends.
COPENHAGEN, Denmark — Norway will close its representative office in the Palestinian territories “until further notice” following a decision by Israel to revoke the accreditation of Norwegian diplomats working there, the foreign minister said Friday.
Norway considers the early August decision by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government to be "extreme and unreasonable,” Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said as he announced the closure of the Representative Office in the West Bank town of Al Ram, nearly 30 years after it opened in 1995.
“This decision seeks to target the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority and all those who defend international law, the two-state solution and the Palestinians’ legitimate right to self-determination,” Barth Eide said. Norway “will do our utmost to ensure that this does not affect our work for Palestine and for a viable Palestinian state.”
In May, Norway — together with Spain and Ireland — announced they would recognize a Palestinian state.
DOHA, Qatar — Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Majed al Ansari said the cease-fire talks are still ongoing and will resume Friday.
In a statement carried by the Qatari News Agency, he said “the mediators are resolute in their commitment to move forward in their endeavors to reach a cease-fire in (Gaza) that would facilitate the release of hostages and enable the entry of the largest possible amount of humanitarian aid” into the territory.
