The Israel-Hamas war that has devastated the Gaza Strip yesterday entered its seventh month, with talks toward a truce and hostage release deal expected to resume in Cairo.
As the bloodiest Gaza war passed the half-year mark, Israel’s government has faced a growing international backlash against its military campaign, and mass street protests at home.
Relations with top ally Washington have deteriorated, and the Middle East is on edge over a potential response from Hamas ally Iran to a deadly strike on Tehran’s consulate building in Syria last week that was widely blamed on Israel.
Photo: Reuters
Israel has faced a storm of international outrage over the killing of seven aid workers of the US-based food charity World Central Kitchen in a Gaza air strike on Monday last week.
US President Joe Biden in a terse phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday demanded vastly greater aid deliveries into the territory now threatened by famine.
Biden also urged an “immediate ceasefire” and hinted at making US support for Israel conditional on curtailing the killing of civilians and improving humanitarian conditions.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also demanded that “this terrible conflict must end.”
“We continue to stand by Israel’s right to defeat the threat from Hamas terrorists and defend their security,” Sunak said. “But the whole of the UK is shocked by the bloodshed.”
A Palestinian father-of-six in northern Gaza, Muhammad Yunis, 51, said the territory’s 2.4 million people desperately need a reprieve from the bombardment and suffering.
“It’s been half a year and the bombing and starvation continue,” said the man from Beit Lahia, now a broken landscape of shattered buildings.
“Watching the thin bodies of our children takes away our souls ... I feel helpless and humiliated,” he said. “Isn’t the bombing, death and destruction enough? There are bodies still under the rubble. We can smell the stench.”
In a new push for a ceasefire in Cairo, CIA Director Bill Burns and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani is to join Egyptian officials for indirect talks from yesterday between the Israeli and Hamas delegations, Egypt’s al-Qahera News said.
Hamas has confirmed that its core demands are a complete ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces — conditions Israel has previously rejected.
Biden’s call with Netanyahu included discussions on “empowering his negotiators” to reach a deal, US National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said.
Netanyahu has come under intense pressure at home from families and supporters of hostages, and from a resurgent anti-government protest movement.
On Saturday, tens of thousands of people rallied in Tel Aviv and other cities, demanding “elections now.”
Among the protesters in Kfar Saba was Israel’s centrist opposition leader Yair Lapid, who was later headed to Washington, his Yesh Atid party said.
“They haven’t learnt anything, they haven’t changed,” he said at that rally. “Until we send them home, they won’t give this country a chance to move forward.”
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