The movement Islamist Hamaswhich since the end of April has been studying its response to a proposal truce with Israel in Gazaannounced this Friday that on Saturday he will send a delegation to Cairo to resume negotiations, in a “positive spirit.”
“The Hamas delegation will travel to Cairo tomorrow, Saturday, to continue talks. We highlight the positive spirit with which Hamas leaders treated the ceasefire proposal recently received and we are going to Cairo with the same spirit to reach a agreement,” the movement declared in a statement.
But Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, demands a permanent ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the Gaza Stripdevastated by almost seven months of war.
“Hamas and the Palestinian resistance forces are determined to reach an agreement that meets our people’s demands for a complete cessation of aggression, the withdrawal of occupation forces, the return of the displaced, aid and reconstruction, and an agreement serious exchange,” the statement said.
The truce would be the first since a week-long truce in late November, which allowed for an exchange of 105 hostages held in Gaza for 240 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.
A senior Hamas political official on Friday accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of trying to obstruct negotiations with his public statements reiterating his determination to order an invasion of Rafah, in southern Gaza.
Netanyahu “is not interested in an agreement and that is why he makes statements (…), to frustrate efforts,” added the leader, Hosam Badran, in statements to AFP.
The Israeli president affirms that Rafah is the last bastion of the Hamas commandos and that Israel will not be able to proclaim victory until there is a ground operation in that city, where 1.5 million Palestinians are crowded together, the vast majority displaced by the war. .
“We will enter Rafah and eliminate Hamas battalions, with or without agreement [de tregua]to achieve total victory,” Netanyahu declared on Tuesday.
The war broke out on October 7 after the raid by Hamas commandos that killed 1,170 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped 250 in southern Israel, according to an AFP report based on Israeli data.
Israeli authorities estimate that after the November swap, 129 people remained held in Gaza and that 35 of them died.
The offensive launched by Israel in response to the attack has so far left 34,622 dead in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas government’s Ministry of Health.
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