GAZA: Hamas said Wednesday it would not bow down to threats from the Zionist entity and the United States, which demanded the group release captives this weekend or face a return to war in Gaza. Mediators Qatar and Egypt were pushing to salvage the ceasefire agreement, a Palestinian source and a diplomat familiar with the talks told AFP, while Hamas said its top negotiator was in Cairo.
The truce has largely halted more than 15 months of fighting and seen Zionist captives released in batches in exchange for Palestinians in Zionist custody. But the deal, currently in its 42-day first phase, has come under increasing strain. The warring sides, which have yet to agree the next phases of the truce, have traded accusations of violations, spurring concern that the violence could resume.
Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said on Wednesday that the Zionist entity was "evading the implementation of several provisions of the ceasefire agreement”, warning that hostages would not be released without Zionist compliance with the deal. "Our position is clear, and we will not accept the language of American and (Zionist) threats,” said Qassem, after Zionist Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened to "resume intense fighting” if hostages were not released by Saturday.
His threat echoed US President Donald Trump, who said on Monday that "hell” would break loose if Hamas failed to release "all” Zionist captives by then. Netanyahu did not specify whether he was referring to all captives. Hamas has said it would postpone the next captive release scheduled for Saturday, citing Zionist violations, and later insisted it was "committed to the ceasefire”.
Hamas has accused the Zionist entity of failing to meet its commitments under the agreement, including on aid, and cited the deaths of three Gazans at the weekend. Hamas said in a statement that a delegation headed by its top negotiator and Gaza chief Khalil Al-Hayya "arrived in Cairo and began meetings with Egyptian officials”, and was monitoring "the implementation of the ceasefire agreement”.
A senior Hamas official told AFP the delegation "will discuss ways to end the current crisis”. A diplomat familiar with the talks told AFP that mediators were engaged with both the Zionist entity and Hamas to resolve the dispute and ensure the implementation of the agreement. A Palestinian source said earlier that Egypt and Qatar were "working intensively” to "resolve the crisis, compel (the Zionist entity) to implement the humanitarian protocol... and begin negotiations for the second phase”.
UN chief Antonio Guterres has urged Hamas to proceed with the planned release and "avoid at all costs resumption of hostilities in Gaza”. The armed wing of Palestinian group Islamic Jihad, which has fought alongside Hamas in Gaza, said that the fate of Zionist captives it was holding was "directly tied to Netanyahu’s actions”.
Trump had earlier proposed taking over the Gaza Strip and moving its more than two million residents to Jordan or Egypt — a plan experts say would violate international law but which Netanyahu called "revolutionary”. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi and Jordan’s King Abdullah II stressed Wednesday the "unity” of their countries’ positions on Gaza, a day after Trump held talks with the Jordanian monarch in Washington.
"The two leaders affirmed the unity of the Egyptian and Jordanian positions,” on the reconstruction of the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, "without displacing the Palestinian people from their land”, a statement from the Egyptian presidency read. Another statement from the Jordanian royal court said that the two leaders stressed their "shared position” rejecting the forced displacement of Palestinians.
Both statements also referred to their willingness to "cooperate” with Trump to achieve "just and lasting peace” in the Middle East. The Zionist military said it had reinforced its troops around Gaza, and on Wednesday conducted an air strike targeting suspected weapons smugglers in the territory. The Zionist campaign has killed at least 48,222 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians.
In southern Gaza’s Khan Yunis, 48-year-old Saleh Awad told AFP he felt "anxiety and fear”, saying that "(the Zionist entity) is seeking any pretext to reignite the war... and displace” the territory’s inhabitants. Hours after Hamas’ armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said it was postponing Saturday’s hostage release, Trump said that "if all of the hostages aren’t returned by Saturday 12 o’clock... all bets are off and let hell break out”. – AFP