While hope for a lull in Gaza remains slim, a Hamas delegation is expected in Cairo on Friday, December 29, to discuss a three-stage Egyptian plan that provides for renewable truces, staggered releases of hostages and of Palestinian prisoners and, ultimately, a ceasefire ending hostilities with Israel.
The Hamas representation will transmit to the Egyptians “the response of the Palestinian factions, which includes several observations, to their plan,” an official of the Islamist movement, requesting anonymity, told Agence France-Presse (AFP). These observations relate in particular “to the modalities of the planned exchanges and the number of Palestinian prisoners who will be released, and to obtaining guarantees for a total Israeli military withdrawal from the Gaza Strip,” added this official.
“We are in contact [with the mediators] at this very moment,” declared, for his part, the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, during a meeting Thursday in Tel Aviv with families of hostages. I cannot provide further details. We are working to bring them all back. This is our goal. »
Around 250 people were kidnapped during the October 7 attack on Israeli soil by Hamas, of whom 129 remain detained in Gaza, according to the Israeli military. Presented as the oldest woman held, Israeli-American hostage Judith Weinstein Haggai, 70, who also had Canadian citizenship, was announced dead Thursday by her kibbutz, Nir Oz, located just on the edge of the Strip. Gaza. Earlier this week, her kibbutz announced the death of her husband Gadi Haggai, 73, also a hostage in Gaza where their remains are believed to still be.
Gaza population in ‘great danger’, says WHO
At the same time, Israeli forces increased strikes in the Gaza Strip during the night from Thursday to Friday, particularly on Rafah, where Palestinians rushed into piles of rubble in search of survivors. And south of Jerusalem, a Palestinian injured two Israelis in a stabbing attack before being shot dead himself, according to police and rescuers, with Hamas hailing a “heroic operation” carried out in “response” to the situation in Gaza.
The Gazan population remains in “great danger”, warns the World Health Organization (WHO), affirming that “hunger and despair” are worsening in the territory where, according to the United Nations (UN), nearly two million people (85% of the population) were displaced. Many fled several times, pushed onto the roads by the advance of fighting from north to south and evacuation orders from the Israeli army, without however escaping the incessant bombings.
Humanitarian aid, the entry of which is controlled by Israel, only arrives in very limited quantities despite the passing of a Security Council resolution on December 22. Israel on Thursday announced its agreement “in principle” to Cyprus to open a maritime humanitarian corridor between the island and the besieged Palestinian territory.
Since the October 7 attack, the war has killed 21,320 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas administration’s health ministry. In Israel, the attack by Hamas commandos left around 1,140 dead, most of them civilians, according to an AFP count based on the latest official Israeli figures.
An expanding conflict
The conflict in Gaza has reignited tensions across the Middle East, notably on Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, where the Israeli military has spoken of a possible “expansion of fighting.” The Israeli army reported numerous shots from southern Lebanon towards northern Israel, where warning sirens sounded several times in the afternoon on Thursday, and announced strikes on “positions » of Hezbollah.
And late Thursday evening, the Syrian defense ministry announced an Israeli strike near Damascus and in the south of the country. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the strikes particularly targeted the area around Damascus international airport, barely twenty-four hours after the resumption of flights suspended since an Israeli attack at the end of November.
Another front in this broader conflict: Yemen, from where the Houthi rebels, allies of Iran and supporters of Hamas, are increasing their fire towards the Red Sea to slow down international maritime traffic in “support” of Gaza. The US Navy said Thursday evening that it had shot down a drone and an anti-ship ballistic missile fired by the Houthis in the southern Red Sea.
“None of the eighteen ships in the area were damaged, and no injuries were reported,” the US Middle East Command said on X, specifying that this is “the 22nd attempted attack by Houthis against international shipping since October 19.”
The United States also announced a series of sanctions targeting the Houthis’ financing channels, targeting several people and entities in Yemen and Turkey that they consider involved in this financing. Washington accuses Tehran of helping Yemeni rebels carry out these attacks, but the Islamic Republic has always denied providing them with military equipment.