Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has given permission to send the head of the foreign intelligence agency Mossad to a truce in Qatar, his office said Saturday, in a sign of progress in talks over the war in Gaza.
It was not immediately clear when David Barnea would travel to the capital of Qatar, Doha, for the last round of indirect talks between Israel and the militant group Hamas. His presence means that high-level Israeli officials who would have to sign off on any agreement are now involved.
Only one brief lull was achieved in 15 months of war, and that was in the earliest weeks of fighting. Negotiations between the United States, Egypt and Qatar have stalled again since then.
Netanyahu has demanded that they eliminate the ability of Hamas to fight in Gaza. Hamas has called for the full withdrawal of Israeli troops from the largely devastated area.
On Thursday, the Gaza Health Ministry said more than 46,000 Palestinians had been killed in the war, mostly women and children, although it did not say how many were combatants or civilians.
Also being sent to Qatar are the head of Israel's Shin Bet internal security agency and military and political advisers. Netanyahu's office said the decision came after a meeting with his defense minister, security chiefs and negotiators “on behalf of the outgoing and incoming US administrations.” “
The office also released a photo showing Netanyahu with President Donald Trump's special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, who was in Qatar this week.
The families of around 100 hostages who are still being held in Gaza after being caught in the October 7, 2023 militant attack that sparked the war are putting pressure on Netanyahu to reach a deal to free the hostages. to bring love home.
The recovery of two groups of hosts in the past week has renewed fears that time is running out. Hamas has said that after months of heavy fighting, it is not sure who is alive or dead.
“Return with an agreement that ensures the return of every hostage, down to the last – the living for rehabilitation and the deceased for a proper burial in their own country,” said a statement by a group that represent the families of some guests.
Hamas and other groups killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages into Gaza in the attack that started the war, according to Israeli figures. More than 100 hostages were freed in November 2023, and others have been rescued or their remains recovered over the past year. The Israeli military says it has killed more than 17,000 terrorists in its attack, without providing evidence.
Israel says it has carried out airstrikes on dozens of Hamas targets in Gaza over the past 24 hours, in attacks that Palestinian health authorities said have killed nearly 100 people.
Israel and Hamas are also under pressure from US President Joe Biden and outgoing Trump to reach an agreement before the latter's inauguration on January 20.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said this week that a deal is “very close” and he hoped to complete it before handing over diplomacy to the incoming Trump administration. But US officials have expressed the same hope several times over the past year.
Issues in the talks have included determining which hostages would be released in the first phase of a phased ceasefire deal, which Palestinian prisoners would be released and the extent to which any Israeli soldiers would withdraw from population centers in Gaza.
Inside Gaza
On Saturday, an airstrike killed a five-year-old girl and two male relatives in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, according to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where an Associated Press team saw them.
The girl's body, in a pink sweater, was wrapped in foil and placed on the floor of the morgue. Her father knelt down and pressed his face to hers. “God!” he cried.
Another Israeli airstrike killed at least eight Palestinians including two children and two women in a school shelter in northern Gaza, according to the Palestinian Civil Defense. They said the strike on the Halawa school which shelters displaced people in Jabaliya district also injured 30 others, including 19 children.
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.
The Israeli military said it struck a Hamas command center at an old school in Jabaliya, without providing evidence.
And a strike killed four people on a street in Gaza City, according to Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Basal. In total, Gaza's Ministry of Health said at least 32 bodies had arrived at hospitals in the past 24 hours.
“I'm asking the world, can you hear us? Will we be there?” said Hamza Saleh, one of the majority of Gaza's 2.3 million residents who were displaced. He spoke on Friday in the southern city of Khan Younis as children and others struggled for food aid, while hunger is growing.
