Dozens of people have been killed by overnight Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip, as the Palestinian movement Hamas says it needs more time to consider a proposal for a second ceasefire in its war with Israel.
Hamas' health ministry said on Sunday that at least 92 people were killed overnight. According to the Islamist movement's government press office, an Israeli attack hit a kindergarten in Rafah (south), where people fleeing the fighting had found refuge.
The Israeli army continued bombings of Khan Younes, a large, partially destroyed southern city where Israel says Hamas officials are hiding, according to an AFP journalist.
The same source said airstrikes were also targeting Rafah, further south, as fears grow over a possible military offensive against this overpopulated town on the closed border with Egypt. In this city of 200,000, more than a million displaced Palestinians facing shortages and epidemics are now crowded into shelters and makeshift camps.
“Sold out”
The war was sparked by an unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli soil on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of more than 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.
In response, Israel vowed to “destroy” Hamas and launched a military offensive that left 27,238 people dead, the vast majority of them civilians, according to the Islamist movement's health ministry. On Sunday, the Israeli army announced the death of a soldier, bringing the number of soldiers killed in Gaza to 225.
The war has led to an exodus of population and, according to the UN, more than 1.3 million residents of Rafah's total population of 2.4 million are now refugees.
“We want this war to end because we are exhausted. We hope to return home even if our homes are in ruins,” said Abdelsalam Abou al-Shaar, who fled Gaza City in the territory’s north. “We are defenseless civilians. Why are they bombing everyone?”
Israel's ground offensive, which began on October 27 in the north of the Gaza Strip, expanded south to Khan Younes in early December.
For Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, Rafah is the next target. “We will reach Rafah and eliminate the terrorist elements that threaten us,” he said on Thursday.
Hamas investigates ceasefire plan
On the diplomatic front, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is expected in the Middle East on Sunday to support negotiations on a new ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. He is scheduled to travel to Qatar, Egypt, Israel, the occupied West Bank and Saudi Arabia.
Negotiations for a second ceasefire continue, longer than the week that allowed the release of around a hundred hostages held in Gaza in late November in exchange for Palestinians detained by Israel.
According to Israel, around 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza on October 7th, and 132 hostages remain in custody. 27 of them were declared dead by the army.
Qatar-based Hamas leader Ismaïl Haniyeh is expected to discuss a draft deal drawn up by Qatari, American and Egyptian mediators in Egypt.
According to a source at Hamas, an organization classified as “terrorist” by Israel, the United States and the European Union, a six-week ceasefire is initially planned with the release of 200 to 300 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel in exchange for 35 to 40 hostages.
In Beirut, a leader of the Palestinian movement, Osama Hamdane, stressed that it was premature to talk about agreeing to a ceasefire. The project “is a framework agreement that needs to be studied,” he said.
New American strikes
Hamas, which seized power in Gaza in 2007, has called for a final ceasefire, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected despite growing pressure from hostage relatives and the international community.
Several hundred people demonstrated again in Tel Aviv on Saturday, demanding the return of the hostages and the government's resignation.
On other fronts in the region, army spokesman Daniel Hagari said Saturday that Israeli forces had attacked “more than 3,400 targets” of Hezbollah in southern Lebanon since October, killing 200 “terrorists and commanders.” “More than 50 targets” of Hezbollah in Syria had been attacked, he added.
There are daily exchanges of fire between Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas, and the Israeli army on the Israeli-Lebanese border.
Elsewhere in the region, Syria and Iraq have denounced deadly attacks by the United States against pro-Iranian groups on their territory in retaliation for a Jan. 28 attack on an American military base in Jordan that left three soldiers dead.
On Saturday, the United States, Israel's top backer alongside the United Kingdom, said it had bombed dozens of targets in Yemen on Saturday in response to repeated attacks on ships by Iran-backed Houthi rebels.