US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday visited Egypt as part of his latest Middle East crisis tour, seeking a new ceasefire and “an enduring end” to the Israel-Hamas war.
Heavy strikes and fighting in Gaza killed at least 99 people overnight, mostly women and children, said the health ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory that has been under almost four months of bombardment.
Fears grew for more than 1 million Palestinians crowded into the far southern Rafah area as the battlefront draws ever closer in Israel’s campaign to eradicate Hamas over the Oct. 7 attack.
Photo: AP
Israeli Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant on Monday warned that the military “will reach places where we have not yet fought ... right up to the last Hamas bastion, which is Rafah,” on the Egyptian border.
Blinken — on his fifth regional tour since the bloodiest-ever Gaza war broke out — was due to meet Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, a day after he held talks with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman in Riyadh.
US Department of State spokesman Matthew Miller said Blinken and the crown prince discussed regional steps to achieve an enduring end to the war, tackling the humanitarian disaster in Gaza and limiting regional spillovers of the crisis.
The US top envoy was later expected in Qatar and then Israel, hoping to shore up support for a truce deal that was hashed out in Paris last month, but has not yet been signed off on by either Hamas or Israel.
Israeli troops, with air and naval support, have been engaged in heavy urban combat centered on Gaza’s main southern city of Khan Yunis, the hometown of Hamas’ Gaza chief, Yahya Sinwar, much of which has been reduced to rubble.
Israel accuses Sinwar of masterminding the Oct. 7 attack, which resulted in the deaths of about 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an Agence France-Presse tally based on official figures.
Militants also seized about 250 hostages. Israel says 132 remain in Gaza, including 28 who are believed to have been killed.
Israel’s withering military campaign has killed at least 27,585 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, Gaza’s health ministry said.
The army yesterday said that “over the past day, dozens of terrorists have been killed and approximately 80 individuals suspected of involvement in terrorist activity have been apprehended, including a number of terrorists that took part in the October 7 massacre.”
It added that army snipers had killed more than 15 militants, and that a naval vessel had fired missiles at a “terrorist cell.”
The truce Blinken is hoping to seal proposes a six-week pause to fighting as Hamas frees hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel and more aid enters Gaza, a Hamas source said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has faced divisions within his Cabinet and public fury over the fate of the remaining hostages, said Israel “will not accept” demands Hamas has made for an exchange involving thousands of prisoners.
His right-wing Likud party quoted him as saying the terms “should be similar to the previous agreement” in late November, which saw a more limited ratio of Palestinian prisoners exchanged for captives.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in a phone call on Monday also told Netanyahu that “only a negotiated two-state solution would open up the prospect of a sustainable solution to the Middle East conflict.”
Additionally, French Minister of Foreign Affairs Stephane Sejourne, on his first visit to the region since taking office, urged the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks “without delay.”
Additional reporting by Reuters
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