The leader of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, Ismaïl Haniyeh, is expected in Egypt on Thursday to discuss a new truce in the Gaza Strip where fighting and Israeli raids continue despite a critical humanitarian situation.
Information to remember
⇒ Houthi and Iranian drones destroyed by the United States
⇒ Hamas leader expected in Egypt
⇒ Colombian president offers mediation
Houthi and Iranian drones destroyed by the United States
The US military announced on Wednesday a series of military operations against Houthi rebels in Yemen who threaten shipping in the Red Sea, claiming to have destroyed more than a dozen attack drones, missiles and a command post .
Wednesday around 8:30 p.m. local time (5:30 p.m. GMT), “Iran-backed Houthi rebels launched an anti-ship ballistic missile from areas they control in Yemen towards the Gulf of Aden. The missile was shot down by the USS Carney,” announced the American military Command in the Middle East (Centcom) in a press release.
Less than an hour later, this same destroyer “shot down three Iranian drones” which were “near” it, Centcom added, without specifying whether these machines were armed or not. And in the evening, Centcom again announced that American strikes had destroyed ten attack drones and a Houthi command post in Yemen, which “constituted an imminent threat to American merchant ships and military vessels in the region” .
Israeli strikes in Khan Younes
During the night, witnesses reported Israeli strikes near the Nasser hospital in Khan Younes, a large town in the south of the territory where, according to Israel, local Hamas leaders are hiding.
Over the past few days, the Israeli army had indicated that it had “encircled” the locality, defeated Hamas battalions towards its eastern portion and was now concentrating its actions on the western slope. The Hamas Health Ministry counted 119 dead in strikes in Gaza last night, while the Palestinian Wafa agency reported violent clashes in Toubas, in the occupied West Bank.
184,000 Palestinians requested humanitarian aid
For its part, the UN reported “intense bombardments” across the Gaza Strip, and in particular in Khan Younes, indicating that 184,000 Palestinians had registered to request humanitarian aid after being forced to leave. the western part of the city. “At the moment, what is happening is a massacre,” Léo Cans, head of mission for Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in the Palestinian Territories, told AFP.
“It is not possible that today in a war where people are not allowed to leave, where people are under siege, where they have nowhere to go, that we agree to kill 150 women and children per day (…) So the first demand is an immediate and total ceasefire,” he added.
Nearly four months after the start of the war which devastated the besieged Palestinian territory, the population is “starving” and “being pushed to the brink”, denounced an official from the World Health Organization (WHO) , Michael Ryan.
Hamas leader expected in Egypt
To support efforts for a possible second truce, the head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken will return “in the coming days” to the Middle East, an American official indicated without saying to which countries.
The leader of Hamas, Ismaïl Haniyeh, based in Qatar, is expected in Egypt on Thursday to discuss an initiative formulated during a meeting last weekend in Paris between the director of the CIA, William Burns, and Egyptian officials, Israelis and Qataris. According to a Hamas source, the Palestinian Islamist movement is examining a proposal in three phases, the first of which concerns a six-week truce during which Israel will have to release between 200 to 300 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for 35 to 40 hostages held in Gaza, and 200 to 300 aid trucks will be able to enter the Palestinian territory every day.
For the moment, Hamas is demanding a total ceasefire as a prerequisite for any agreement, while the Israeli government is talking about a pause in the fighting but not the end of its operation in Gaza.
Colombian president offers mediation
Colombian President Gustavo Petro proposed Wednesday to negotiate the release of Israeli hostages held by Palestinian Hamas in Gaza through a “peace commission”, in response to a request from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“With the clear objective of leading us towards a consensus (…) I consider it a priority to move quickly towards a cessation of hostilities and to begin talks for the release of all the hostages”, affirmed in a letter the Colombian leader.
UNRWA is “totally infiltrated” by Hamas
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told UN ambassadors in Jerusalem on Wednesday that the United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) was “totally infiltrated” by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.
“UNRWA is totally infiltrated by Hamas,” and “we need other United Nations agencies and other humanitarian organizations” in its place, he said, while this agency is being blamed. by Israel for the alleged participation of some of its employees in the October 7 attack, which caused the suspension of its funding by major donor countries.