New US bid to end Gaza war as South Africa appeals to UN court
▶ Six-week pause in fighting and hostage exchange among proposed terms submitted to Israel and Hamas as tension grows over planned Rafah assault
New proposals aimed at ending the war in Gaza have been agreed to by the US and regional allies, according to sources.
Under the plan from Washington Egypt and Qatar, there would be a six-week pause in the fighting, during which a detainee and hostage swap between Israel and Hamas would take place, sources told The
National. The proposals were reached during talks in Cairo that brought together CIA director William Burns, his Egyptian and Israeli counterparts and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Qatar’s intelligence chief.
This came as South Africa made an “urgent plea” to the UN’s top court yesterday, in an effort to halt Israel’s offensive in Gaza.
This intervention came as the Israeli army closed in for a ground offensive on the city of Rafah in southern Gaza – where more than half of the Palestinian enclave’s population of 2.3 million have taken refuge.
In a letter to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the South African government asked judges to determine whether it can force Israel to halt its assault on Rafah.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed this will go ahead, despite mounting concern abroad.
“The South African government said it was gravely concerned that the unprecedented military offensive against Rafah, as announced by the state of Israel, has already led to and will result in further large-scale killing, harm and destruction,” South Africa said.
An Israeli invasion of Rafah “would be in serious and irreparable breach” of both of the Genocide Convention and the court’s January order compelling Israel to avoid acts of genocide in Gaza, it added.
More than 28,400 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since the war began. Israeli strikes followed an attack by Hamas on Israeli communities on October 7, in which 1,200 people were killed and 240 abducted.
Mediators from the US, Egypt and Qatar have agreed on a framework to end the war in Gaza, sources told The National yesterday.
The proposed agreement includes a six-week pause in hostilities, during which Israel and Hamas would carry out a detainee and hostage exchange. The truce would be offered “on the understanding” that a comprehensive ceasefire would follow, the sources said.
The framework also mandates a phased Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the formation of an interim Palestinian government made up of technocrats to run the territory during the enclave’s reconstruction.
The mediators have sent the proposed agreement to Hamas and the Israeli government, and are awaiting their responses, the sources said.
The framework was drawn up yesterday as a result of talks in Cairo between CIA director William Burns, Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman, and intelligence chiefs from Egypt, Israel and Qatar.
Representatives from the same four countries met for talks in Paris last month and formulated a plan to end the fighting in Gaza. However, Hamas responded with counterproposals that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later rejected outright, necessitating another round of negotiations.
Hamas’s proposals included a four-and-a-half-month truce during which all hostages would be freed, Israel would withdraw its troops from Gaza and an agreement would be reached to bring an end to the war.
The militant group also proposed that Israel should release 5,000 Palestinian detainees from its prisons in exchange for the estimated 130 hostages still held in Gaza, including the bodies of those who have died in captivity. Almost 30 of the hostages are presumed dead.
Mr Netanyahu called the plan “delusional” and pledged to continue the military offensive in Gaza to achieve complete victory over Hamas.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was in the region last week on his fifth Middle East tour since the war started, said Hamas’s counterproposals had some merit but included “non-starters”.
Mr Burns and Sheikh Mohammed held separate talks yesterday with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi. During the meeting, they discussed the situation in Gaza, along with efforts to halt the fighting and ensure the enclave receives sufficient humanitarian aid.
Speaking at the White House on Monday, US President Joe Biden also talked about the possibility of a hostage exchange deal between Israel and Hamas, which would bring an immediate and sustained period of calm into Gaza for at least six weeks.
Mr Biden said he was working on the issue “day and night”, and voiced hopes that a sixweek pause in hostilities would provide a foundation “to build something more enduring”.
The treaty limits the number of troops on both sides of their border in the Sinai Peninsula, although the two nations have in the past agreed to modify those arrangements in response to specific security threats. This has allowed Israel to focus its military on other threats.
The latest round of talks in Cairo comes amid growing fears of heavy civilian casualties if Israel goes ahead with its planned ground operation in the southern city of Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population have sought refuge from the fighting.
In anticipation of a Rafah offensive, Egypt has reinforced its military presence on its border with Gaza and Israel, placed its troops on high alert and increased the frequency of ground patrols and reconnaissance flights over the area.
It has said a ground operation in Rafah would have “dire” consequences, and threatened to void the 1979 peace treaty between the two countries if the incursion goes ahead.
Like the US and other nations, Egypt fears an Israeli incursion into Rafah will result in a high number of civilian casualties and force hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to cross the border into the Sinai Peninsula.
Cairo believes Israel would not allow Palestinians who seek refuge in Egypt to return home, which would place another obstacle in the path of any future talks to end the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The potential mass movement of Palestinians into the peninsula would also put Egypt’s national security at risk.
However, suspending the peace treaty with Israel would have serious ramifications for Egypt, which has received billions of dollars in US military and economic assistance as a reward for signing it and adhering to its provisions. Fuelling the tension, Egypt and Israel were involved in yet another public dispute on Monday after Israel’s farright Finance Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, claimed that Cairo bore “considerable responsibility” for Hamas’s October 7 attacks on southern Israeli communities.
Despite growing calls to reconsider the move, Mr Netanyahu appears to be determined to go ahead with a full-scale ground offensive in Rafah.
On Sunday, he confirmed his intention to send Israeli troops into the city. He said his government was working on a plan to evacuate civilians from the area beforehand, although many have noted that it is unclear where more than one million displaced Palestinians could go in Gaza and be safe.
On Monday, EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell strongly condemned Israel’s plan ned operation and said Mr Netanyahu “doesn’t listen to anyone”.
“They are going to evacuate. Where? To the Moon? Where are they going to evacuate these people?” Mr Borrell asked.
He urged the US to use its influence as Israel’s primary weapons supplier to convince Mr Netanyahu to take greater steps to minimise civilian deaths in Gaza.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said on Monday that the group “has shown great flexibility in the talks to end the aggression and swap the captives, but the occupation is still stalling and disrespecting the efforts that are being done”.
During a week-long truce in late November last year, Hamas released more than 100 hostages in exchange for about 200 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
The framework includes the formation of an interim government of technocrats to oversee Gaza’s reconstruction