A new proposal from Israel for a ceasefire in Gaza would be examined on Saturday by senior Hamas officials.
Khalil al-Hayva, a senior Hamas official, said the Palestinian militant group was evaluating the Israeli proposal and “once its study is completed, it will submit its response.”
According to the Associated Press, he did not give further details about Israel’s offer but said it was a response to a Hamas proposal two weeks ago.
The Hamas statement comes hours after a high-level Egyptian delegation concluded its visit to Israel where it discussed a “new vision” for an extended ceasefire in Gaza, according to an Egyptian official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to freely discuss developments.
It was not immediately clear whether Israel’s latest response to Hamas regarding a ceasefire was directly linked to the Egyptian mediator’s visit to Tel Aviv on Friday.
The discussions between Egyptian and Israeli officials focused on the first step of a multi-phase plan that would include a limited exchange of hostages held by Hamas for Palestinian prisoners, and the return of a significant number of displaced Palestinians to their homes in northern Gaza. with minimal restrictions,” the Egyptian official said.
Mediators are working on a compromise that will meet most of the main demands of both sides, which could pave the way for continued negotiations with the aim of reaching a broader agreement to end the war, the official said .
Next week, Egypt’s foreign minister is expected to take stock with international officials in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, at a meeting of the World Economic Forum, Reuters reported.
Børge Brende, president of the WEF, told a press conference on Saturday that the update would be part of talks between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and several international officials aimed at promoting a peace deal in Gaza.
“We now have the key players in Riyadh and we hope that the discussions can lead to a process of reconciliation and peace,” Brende said, adding that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza would be on the agenda of the GEF meeting. .
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will attend the meetings alongside regional leaders, including the prime minister of Qatar, the foreign minister of Saudi Arabia, the crown prince of Oman and Bahraini officials, Brende said.
“There is now some momentum for hostage negotiations and also for a possible ceasefire,” Brende said.
As the war drags on and casualties mount, international pressure mounts for Hamas and Israel to reach a ceasefire agreement and avoid a possible Israeli attack on Rafah, where more than half of the 2 .3 million Gaza residents have found refuge after finding refuge. fleeing fighting elsewhere in the territory.
Israel has for months insisted on its intention for a ground offensive on Rafah, on the border with Egypt, where it says many remaining Hamas militants are holed up, despite calls for restraint from the international community, including understood by Israel’s most loyal ally, the United States.
Egypt has warned that an offensive on Rafah could have “catastrophic consequences” for the humanitarian situation in Gaza, as well as regional peace and security.
The Israeli army has massed dozens of tanks and armored vehicles in southern Israel near Rafah and hit targets in the city in near-daily airstrikes.
On Saturday morning, an Israeli airstrike hit a house in the Tel Sultan neighborhood of Rafah, killing six people, including four children, according to officials at a local hospital.
The strike killed a man, his wife and their three sons, aged 12, 10 and 8, according to records from the Abu Yousef al-Najjar hospital morgue. A neighbor’s four-month-old daughter was also killed, records show.
Five people were also killed overnight in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza when an Israeli strike hit a house, according to officials at al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.
Elsewhere, Israeli forces shot dead two Palestinian men in an exchange of fire at a checkpoint in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the army said.
Violence in the West Bank has erupted since the start of the war. Since then, 491 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the territory, according to the Ramallah-based Ministry of Health.
The Israeli military said the two men were killed after opening fire from a vehicle on Israeli troops stationed at the Salem checkpoint, near the Palestinian town of Jenin.
The United States has criticized Israeli policy in the West Bank and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, expected in Israel on Tuesday, recently determined that a military unit there committed human rights abuses before the Gaza war.
But Blinken said in an undated letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson: obtained by CBS News Fridaythat he postpone the decision to block aid to unity to give Israel more time to repair wrongdoing.
The information comes as Blinken weighs whether to recommend suspending U.S. aid to the unit under a federal measure known as the Leahy Act. The law prevents the United States from providing weapons or funds for military assistance to groups when there is credible information that the groups have violated human rights.
According to a source with knowledge of the letter, Johnson sought assurances from Blinken before putting a long-delayed foreign aid package up for a House vote. Blinken’s letter was delivered to Johnson last Saturday, the day the vote was scheduled to take place.
The United States also built a dock to deliver aid to Gaza through a new port, which an official said last week was on track to begin operating in early May.
The Biden administration emphasized that there would be no U.S. troops on the ground for the mission. However, the BBC reported on Saturday that the British government was considering deploying troops to drive aid trucks to shore, citing unidentified government sources. British officials declined to comment on this information.
Hamas sparked the war with its attack in southern Israel on October 7, in which militants killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people hostage. Israel says militants still hold around 100 hostages and the remains of more than 30 others.
Since then, more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli air and ground offensive, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, about two-thirds of them children and women.
Israel has reported at least 260 of its soldiers killed since the start of ground operations in Gaza.
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