Netanyahu says Israel will return to table for ceasefire talks with Hamas
Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel will return to the table for ceasefire talks with Hamas.
Yesterday’s announcement marks yet another attempt to reach a deal with the militant group that would pause Israel's military offensive in Gaza in exchange for the release of Israeli hostages.
Several rounds of negotiations have faltered.
Mr Netanyahu says he has spoken with Israel's lead negotiators and authorised Israeli delegations to join talks in Qatar and Egypt over the coming days.
With the war now grinding through a sixth month, the United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to negotiate another ceasefire and hostage release. But those efforts appear to have stalled.
Hamas has previously proposed a phased process in which it would release all the remaining hostages in exchange for an end to the war and full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the opening of its borders for aid and reconstruction, and the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including top militants serving life sentences.
Mr Netanyahu has called the demands delusional and vowed to resume Israel's offensive after any hostage release and keep fighting until the militant group is destroyed.
Hamas is believed to be holding roughly 100 hostages, as well as the remains of about 30 people killed in the group's October 7 attack, which triggered the war, or who died in captivity.
Meanwhile, the Syrian army says Israeli airstrikes near the northern city of Aleppo killed or wounded“a number of” people and caused damage.
An opposition war monitor said the strikes killed 42, most of them Syrian troops.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said Israeli strikes hit missile depots for Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group in Aleppo’s southern suburb of
Jibreen, near the Aleppo International Airport, and the nearby town of Safira, home to a sprawling military facility.
The observatory said 36 Syrian troops and six Hezbollah fighters died, and dozens of people were wounded, calling it the deadliest such attack in years.
There was no immediate statement from Israeli officials on the strikes.
Israel, which has vowed to stop Iranian entrenchment in its northern neighbour, has carried out hundreds of strikes on targets in government controlled parts of Syria in recent years, but it rarely acknowledges them.
On Thursday, Syrian state media reported airstrikes near the capital, Damascus, saying they wounded two civilians.
Hezbollah has had an armed presence in syria since it joined the country’s conflict fighting alongside government forces.
Aleppo, syria’ s largest city and once its commercial centre, has come under such attacks in the past that led to the closure of its international airport. Yesterday’s strike did not affect the airport.
The strikes have escalated over the past five months against the back drop of the war in Gaza and ongoing clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces on the Lebanon-israel border.