Hamas’ armed wing spokesperson has said that while the group favours reaching an interim truce in the Gaza war, if such an agreement is not reached in current negotiations it could revert to insisting on a full package deal to end the conflict.
Hamas has repeatedly offered to release all the hostages held in Gaza and conclude a permanent ceasefire agreement, and Israel has refused, Abu Ubaida added in a televised speech.
Arab mediators Qatar and Egypt, backed by the United States, have hosted more than 10 days of talks on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day truce in the war that has laid waste to the Palestinian enclave.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on a call he had with Pope Leo that Israel’s efforts to secure a hostage release deal and 60-day ceasefire, ‘have so far not been reciprocated by Hamas’.
As part of the potential deal, 10 hostages held in Gaza would be returned along with the bodies of 18 others, spread out over 60 days. In exchange, Israel would release a number of detained Palestinians.
“If the enemy remains obstinate and evades this round as it has done every time before, we cannot guarantee a return to partial deals or the proposal of the 10 captives,” said Abu Ubaida.
Disputes remain over maps of Israeli army withdrawals, aid delivery mechanisms into Gaza, and guarantees that any eventual truce would lead to ending the war, said two Hamas officials who spoke to Reuters yesterday.
The officials said the talks have not reached a breakthrough on the issues under discussion.
Hamas says any agreement must lead to ending the war, while Netanyahu says the war will only end once Hamas is disarmed and its leaders expelled from Gaza.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 58,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.
Palestinian Bedouins meanwhile accused Israeli settlers of killing 117 sheep in an overnight attack and stealing hundreds of others in an apparent effort to chase farmers off their land in the occupied West Bank.
The incident comes amid what the United Nations described this week as intensifying attacks by Jewish settlers and security forces against Palestinians in the West Bank and record mass displacements.
The Israeli army did not respond to a request for comment about the mass slaughter of the animals belonging to the Arab Al Kaabaneh Bedouin community, in the Jordan Valley.
Veterinarians were called in to treat a handful of sheep which had survived the knife and gun attack, some of the animals shaking uncontrollably and in apparent shock.
Salem Salman Mujahed, a resident of Arab Al Kaabaneh, said multiple groups of settlers working in co-ordination had orchestrated the assault, and accused the army of standing by.
“(Settlers) came near the houses. I asked them what are you doing here then we started fighting with each other,” he said. “The army detained me, and they handcuffed me.”
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