GAZA: The Zionist entity was considering its response on Saturday after Hamas said it was ready to start talks “immediately” on a US-sponsored proposal for a Gaza ceasefire. The security cabinet was expected to meet after the end of the Jewish sabbath at sundown to discuss the Zionist entity’s next steps, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepared to head to Washington for talks on Monday with US President Donald Trump.

Trump has been making a renewed push to end nearly 21 months of war in Gaza, where the civil defense agency said 70 people were killed in Zionist military operations on Saturday. Hamas made its announcement late Friday after holding consultations with other Palestinian factions. “The movement is ready to engage immediately and seriously in a cycle of negotiations on the mechanism to put in place” the US-backed truce proposal, the group said in a statement.

Two Palestinian sources close to the discussions told AFP that the proposal included a 60-day truce, during which Hamas would release 10 living captives

and several bodies in exchange for Palestinians detained by the Zionist entity. However, they said, the group was also demanding certain conditions for the Zionist entity’s withdrawal, guarantees against a resumption of fighting during negotiations and the return of the UN-led aid distribution system.

Hamas ally Islamic Jihad said it supported ceasefire talks, but demanded guarantees that the Zionist entity “will not resume its aggression” once captives held in Gaza are freed. Trump, when asked about Hamas’ response aboard Air Force One, said: “That’s good. They haven’t briefed me on it. We have to get it over with. We have to do something about Gaza.”

Nearly 21 months of war have created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people in the Gaza Strip, where the Zionist entity has recently expanded its military operations. A US- and Zionist-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, took the lead in food distribution in the territory in late May, when the Zionist entity partially lifted a more than two-month blockade on aid deliveries.

The group said two of its US staff were wounded in an “attack” on one of its aid centers in southern Gaza on Saturday. “This morning, two American aid workers were injured in a targeted terrorist attack during food distribution activities at SDS-3 in Khan Yunis,” the organization said, adding that reports indicated it was carried out by “two assailants who threw two grenades at the Americans”.

UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives. Its operations have been marred by near-daily reports of Zionist fire on people waiting to collect rations. UN human rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said Friday that more than 500 people have been killed waiting to access food from GHF distribution points.

GHF’s chairman Johnnie Moore, a Christian evangelical leader allied to Trump, on Wednesday rejected calls for the lead role in Gaza aid distributions to revert to UN agencies. “We will not be shut down. We have one job to do. It’s very simple, every day to provide free food to the people of Gaza,” he told reporters. The Zionist campaign has killed at least 57,338 people in Gaza, mostly civilians. – AFP