Hamas studies new Israeli truce proposal
Video released of two hostages, calling for deal
JERUSALEM (AFP) — Hamas said Saturday it was studying Israel’s latest counterproposal for a Gaza ceasefire, a day after media reports said a delegation from mediator Egypt was in Israel trying to jump-start stalled negotiations.
The armed wing of Hamas also released video footage of two men held hostage in Gaza, identified by Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum as Keith Siegel and Omri Miran.
The signs of fresh truce talks come after the United Nations warned that “famine thresholds in Gaza will be breached within the next six weeks” unless massive food assistance arrives.
Aid groups say Gaza’s already catastrophic humanitarian conditions would be worsened by Israel’s vow to attack Hamas fighters still in Rafah city in southernmost Gaza.
Rafah, on the border with Egypt, is crowded with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced by nearly seven months of war between Israel and the Islamist movement.
“We live in constant terror and fear of repeated displacement and invasion,” Nidaa Safi, 30, who fled Israeli strikes in the north and came to Rafah with her husband and children, told AFP.
Khalil al-Hayya, deputy head of Hamas’s political arm in Gaza, said it had “received the official Zionist occupation response to the movement’s position, which was delivered to the Egyptian and Qatari mediators on April 13.”
In a statement, Hayya said Hamas “will study this proposal” before responding.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive against Hamas has killed at least 34,388 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, the health ministry said Saturday.
Israel estimates that 129 hostages seized by militants on Oct. 7 are still being held in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.
Israeli demonstrators have intensified protests for their government to reach a deal that would free the captives, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of prolonging the war.
The latest hostage video comes just three days after Hamas released another video showing hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin alive.
Both Siegel and Miran appeared to speak under duress in the video.
“It’s time to reach a deal that will get us out of here safe and healthy… Keep protesting, so that there will be a deal now,” Miran said in the footage that appeared to have been recorded earlier this week.
U.S. citizen Siegel, 64, broke down as he talked of their captivity. “We are in danger here, there are bombs, it is stressful and scary,” he said.
Blinken heads to Saudi Arabia for Gaza talks
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will hold talks in Saudi Arabia on Monday and Tuesday on efforts to reach a Gaza ceasefire and prevent a larger regional conflict, the State Department said.
Blinken, who will depart Sunday, will meet with ministers from the bloc of Gulf Arab states on his first trip to the region since the long shadow war between their regional rival Iran and U.S. ally Israel escalated into direct conflict.