The United States, along with Arab mediators, on Wednesday called for an agreement between Israel and Hamas to end the 14-month-old war in the Gaza Strip, where medics said that Israeli strikes killed at least 20 Palestinians overnight.
A Palestinian official close to the talks said Wednesday that mediators had narrowed loopholes in most of the agreement's clauses. He said Israel had introduced terms that Hamas rejected but would not elaborate.
On Tuesday, sources close to the talks in Cairo said an agreement could be signed in the coming days on a ceasefire and the release of hostages held in Gaza in return for the release of Palestinian prisoners. are held by Israel.
Medics said an Israeli airstrike killed at least 10 people in a house in the northern town of Beit Lahiya while six people were killed in separate airstrikes in Gaza City, Nuseirat camp in central areas, and Rafah near the border with Egypt.
In Beit Hanoun in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, medics said four people were killed in an airstrike on a house. There was no immediate comment from an Israeli military spokesman.
Israeli forces have been operating in the towns of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya as well as the nearby Jabalia camp since October, in an operation the military said was aimed at preventing Hamas militants from to regroup.
Palestinians accuse Israel of carrying out acts of “ethnic cleansing” to level the northern edge of the sea to create a buffer zone. Israel denies it.
Hamas does not publish its casualties, and the Palestinian health ministry does not differentiate in its daily death toll between combatants and non-combatants.
On Wednesday, the Israeli military said it struck several Hamas terrorists who were planning an upcoming attack against Israeli forces operating in Jabalia.
Later on Wednesday, Muhammad Saleh, director of Al-Awda Hospital in Jabalia, said nearby Israeli shelling damaged the facility, injuring seven doctors and one patient inside the hospital.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment.
In the Central Gaza camp of Bureij, Palestinian families began to leave some areas after the army sent new evacuation orders on X and in written and audio messages to the mobile phones of some of the people there, announcing shooting new rockets by Palestinian militants from the area. .
Amnesty International has accused the state of Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza war in a new report, a charge Israel has vehemently denied, saying it has been honored brought to international law.
A cease-fire gets a boost
The US administration, along with mediators from Egypt and Qatar, have done intensive efforts in the past few days to advance negotiations before US President Joe Biden leaves office next month.
In Jerusalem, Israeli President Isaac Herzog met with Adam Boehler, US President Donald Trump's designated ambassador for hostile affairs. Trump has threatened that “all hell is going to break loose” if Hamas does not release its enemies by January 20, the day Trump returns to the White House.
CIA Director William Burns was expected in Doha, Qatar, on Wednesday for talks with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani about closing the remaining gaps between Israel and Hamas, other informed sources said. The CIA declined to comment.
Israeli negotiators in Doha on Monday were looking to close gaps between Israel and Hamas on a deal outlined in May.
More than 14 months into the Israel-Hamas war, Gaza is slipping into lawlessness and aid groups say the breakdown threatens the lives of up to two million people.
There have been several talks over the past year, all of which have failed, with Israel insisting on maintaining a military presence in Gaza and Hamas refusing to release hostages until it withdrew. the soldiers out.
The war in Gaza, sparked by a Hamas-led attack on communities in southern Israel that killed around 1,200 people and saw more than 250 kidnapped as hostages, has sent shock waves across the Middle East and has left Israel internationally isolated.
Israel's campaign has killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, displaced most of its 2.3 million population and reduced much of the coastal enclave to ruins.
