Hamas on Thursday signalled its rejection of Israel’s latest truce proposal and called for a “comprehensive” deal to end the 18-month-long war.
The Palestinian militants’ chief negotiator spoke out after civil defence rescuers in Gaza said new Israeli air strikes killed at least 40 people, most of them in camps for displaced civilians, as Israel pressed its offensive in the Palestinian territory.
The Israeli military said it was looking into reports of the strikes.
A Hamas source told AFP that the group sent a written response Thursday to mediators on Israel’s latest proposal for a 45-day ceasefire. Israel had wanted the release of 10 living hostages held by the group, according to Hamas.
It also called for the freeing of 1,231 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails and the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza, which has been under complete blockade since March 2.
The proposal called for Hamas to disarm to secure a complete end to the war, a demand the group rejects.
“Partial agreements are used by (Israeli Prime Minister) Benjamin Netanyahu as a cover for his political agenda… we will not be complicit in this policy,” Hamas’s chief negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, said in a televised statement.
He said Hamas “seeks a comprehensive deal involving a single-package prisoner exchange in return for halting the war, a withdrawal of the occupation from the Gaza Strip, and the commencement of reconstruction” in the territory.
A previous ceasefire and hostage release deal began on January 19 but collapsed two months later.
Israel offered to extend the first phase, while Hamas insisted that negotiations be held for a second phase, as outlined by Joe Biden when he was US president.
Israel resumed intensive bombing of Gaza on March 18.
Qatar blames Israel
The emir of Qatar, which with Egypt and the United States helped mediate the January ceasefire, blamed Israel on Thursday for its collapse.
“As you know, we reached an agreement months ago, but unfortunately Israel did not abide by this agreement,” Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani said during a visit to Moscow.
Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said two Israeli missiles hit tents in the Al-Mawasi area of the southern city of Khan Yunis, killing at least 16 people, “most of them women and children, and 23 others were wounded”.
Tens of thousands of Palestinians flocked to Al-Mawasi after Israel declared it a safe zone in December 2023. But the area has since been hit by repeated Israeli strikes.
Survivors described a large explosion at the densely packed camp that set tents ablaze.
“We were sitting peacefully in the tent, under God’s protection, when we suddenly saw something red glowing — and then the tent exploded, and the surrounding tents caught fire,” Israa Abu al-Rus told AFP.
Bassal said Israeli strikes on two other camps for displaced Gazans killed a nine people — seven in the northern town of Beit Lahia, and a father and son near Al-Mawasi.
Separately, the civil defence reported two attacks in Jabalia — one that killed at least seven members of the Asaliya family, and another that killed six people at a school being used as a shelter — as well as Israeli shelling in Gaza City that killed two.
The military announced it had carried out a strike in Jabalia on a Hamas “command and control” centre.
Israel said Wednesday that it had converted 30 percent of Gaza into a buffer zone in its widening offensive.
The United Nations said half a million Palestinians have been displaced since the offensive resumed, triggering what it has described as the most severe humanitarian crisis since the war began with Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Red Cross base
Hamas accused Israel of attempting to starve Gaza’s 2.4 million people after Defence Minister Israel Katz said Wednesday that Israel would continue preventing aid from entering the territory.
“This is a public admission of committing a war crime,” the group said in a statement.
Medical supplies, fuel, water and other essentials are in short supply, the UN says.
The International Committee of the Red Cross, said it was “outraged” that an explosive hit one of its bases in Gaza on Wednesday, the second such strike in three weeks.
Israel’s renewed assault has killed at least 1,691 people in Gaza, the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory reported, bringing the overall toll since the war erupted to 51,065, most of them civilians.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, also mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
