Time for a Gaza truce deal, says US

 

Palestinians receive cooked food rations as part of a volunteer initiative in a makeshift displacement camp in Mawasi Khan Yunis in the besieged Gaza Strip on September 3, 2024. [AFP]

The United States said Tuesday it was time to "finalise" a deal between Israel and Hamas to end the Gaza war after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused to bow to pressure.

Washington would work "over the coming days" with fellow mediators Egypt and Qatar "to push for a final agreement," said US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

He was speaking after Netanyahu rejected "concessions" in indirect negotiations with Hamas, despite growing domestic and international pressure following the recovery by Israel's military of six killed hostages from the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.

"It is time to finalise that deal," Miller said.

The United States on Tuesday unsealed a raft of "terrorism" and other charges against six Hamas leaders related to the group's October 7 attack on Israel which sparked the war in Gaza.

Those targeted in the February charges include Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar and his predecessor Ismail Haniyeh, who had been engaged in truce talks when he was killed in July in an attack blamed on Israel.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk called for an "independent, impartial and transparent investigation" into reports that the six captives recovered dead from Gaza had been summarily executed.

Despite increasing grief and fury among Israelis, who have taken to the streets to pressure the government and express concern for the fate of the hostages, Netanyahu said he would "not give in to pressure".

The Israeli prime minister "has been ruining our chances to get a deal with Hamas to return our hostages alive," Tel Aviv protester Jonathan Edan said Tuesday.

"The only thing he wants to survive is his political career and his coalition," the 26-year-old told AFP.

'Occupy indefinitely'

The Israeli premier on Monday said "the achievement of the war's objectives" requires control of the Philadelphi Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border, to stop Hamas from rearming.

Egypt on Tuesday rejected accusations its Gaza border was being used to arm Hamas, accusing Netanyahu of seeking to "distract Israeli public opinion and obstruct reaching a ceasefire deal".

Saudi Arabia backed Cairo and expressed its "strong condemnation and denunciation of the Israeli statements regarding the Philadelphi Corridor", in a foreign ministry statement.

US President Joe Biden, meeting with negotiators, replied "no" when asked if he thought Netanyahu was doing enough to secure a hostage deal.

Hamas has long demanded a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and Egyptian officials have objected to an Israeli military presence on the border.

Netanyahu "wants to occupy Gaza on some level indefinitely" and was now "just saying it more openly", analyst Mairav Zonszein told AFP.

Israel occupied the Gaza Strip in 1967 and maintained troops and settlers there until 2005, when it withdrew but imposed a crippling blockade and, since the start of the current war, a total siege.

Increasing the pressure on Israel, Britain on Monday said it would suspend some arms exports, citing a "clear risk" they could be used in a serious breach of international humanitarian law.

On Tuesday, the civil defence spokesman in Hamas-run Gaza said an Israeli raid on a college killed two people and wounded 30.

Israel's military said it had targeted "Hamas terrorists" at a Gaza City college.

The civil defence agency, witnesses and AFP correspondents also reported air strikes and shelling across southern and central Gaza.

West Bank raids

As Israeli forces keep up their bombardment of Gaza, the military said Wednesday it "intercepted a hostile UAV that approached Israel from the east" of the country bordering Jordan.

Soldiers also pressed ahead with a week-long assault in the occupied West Bank.

Israeli forces have killed at least 30 Palestinians across the northern West Bank since August 28, the territory's health ministry says, while Israel's military reported one soldier killed in the "counter-terrorism" raids.

Israeli troops have destroyed infrastructure and hindered medics, with the UN's humanitarian agency OCHA saying Israeli forces refused its attempt on Tuesday to reach the community in Jenin.

An AFP journalist saw Palestinian medics trying to pass Israeli troops to reach people trapped in Jenin refugee camp, only to turn back.

"The situation is very catastrophic," said volunteer medic Faraj al-Jundi, after being denied entry.

"We tried to help with what we could."

Vaccination drive

Israel's campaign against Hamas since October 7 has killed at least 40,819 people in Gaza, according to the territory's health ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.

The Hamas attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians and including hostages killed in captivity, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Of 251 hostages seized by Palestinian militants during the attack, 97 remain in Gaza including 33 the Israeli military says are dead. Scores were released during a one-week truce in November -- the only one so far.

Abu Obeida, spokesman for Hamas's armed wing, said Monday remaining hostages would return "inside coffins" if Israel maintains its military pressure on the territory.

With Gaza in ruins and the majority of its 2.4 million residents forced to flee, often taking refuge in cramped and unsanitary conditions, disease has spread.

After the first confirmed polio case in 25 years, a vaccination drive began Sunday amid localised "humanitarian pauses" in the fighting.

More than 161,000 children have now received their first vaccine dose in central Gaza, the World Health Organization said Tuesday. It aims to fully vaccinate more than 640,000 children altogether.