Hamas denies pulling out of talks

A senior Hamas official on Sunday said that the Islamist group had not withdrawn from ceasefire talks with Israel after this weekend’s deadly attacks in Gaza that Israel said had targeted the group’s military leader Mohammed Deif.

But Izzat El-Reshiq, a member of the political office of Hamas, accused Israel of trying to derail efforts by Arab mediators and the US to reach a ceasefire deal by stepping up its attacks in the enclave.

Saturday’s strike in the Khan Younis area of Gaza, in which at least 90 Palestinians were killed according to local health authorities, has put the ceasefire talks in doubt.

There had been hopeful signs recently that a deal could be reached to halt fighting and return hostages held in Gaza. Two Egyptian security sources at ceasefire talks in Doha and Cairo said on Saturday that negotiations had been halted after three days of intense talks.

The strike on Saturday which targeted Deif killed Rafa Salama, commander of Hamas’ Khan Younis brigade, the Israeli military said on Sunday, but there was no confirmation about the fate of Deif.

“The strike in Khan Younis was a result of surgical intelligence,” the head of the Shin Bet domestic security service said in a video released by the service from Rafah. He said 25 Hamas operatives who took part in the deadly October 7 attack in southern Israel that triggered the war had been killed in the past week.

On Saturday, a senior Hamas official denied that Deif had been killed and the group said Israeli claims were aimed at justifying the attack.

On Sunday, Israeli forces continued to press ahead with aerial and ground shelling of several areas across the coastal enclave, home to 2.3 million people, most of whom have been displaced by the war. A strike on a UN-run school in Nuseirat camp, one of the Gaza Strip’s eight longstanding refugee camps, killed 15 Palestinians and wounded dozens more, Hamas media and health officials said.

The Israeli military said the site was used as a base for Hamas fighters to attack Israeli forces and said numerous steps were taken to limit the risk of harming civilians, including the use of precise munitions and intelligence.

Residents said two missiles targeted the upper floor of the school, not far from the camp’s local market, usually busy with shoppers, where displaced families have also taken shelter nearby.

Earlier on Sunday, Israeli air strikes on four houses in Gaza City killed at least 16 Palestinians and wounded dozens of others, medics said.

The Gaza health ministry said at least 38 584 Palestinians have been killed and 88 881 others injured in Israel’s military offensive since October 7. It added that 141 Palestinians were killed by Israeli military strikes across the Gaza Strip in the past day, the biggest one-day death toll in many weeks.

Gaza’s health ministry does not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants but officials say most of the dead in the war have been civilians. Israel has lost 326 soldiers in Gaza and says at least a third of the Palestinian fatalities are fighters.

Displaced people sheltering in the area said their tents were torn down by the force of Saturday’s strike, describing bodies and body parts strewn on the ground. UN chief Antonio Guterres said he was “shocked and saddened” by the civilian deaths, which underscored “nowhere is safe in Gaza,” and said international humanitarian law must be upheld.

Deif has survived seven Israeli assassination attempts, the most recent in 2021, and has topped Israel’s most wanted list for decades, held responsible for the deaths of dozens of Israelis in suicide bombings.

The Gaza health ministry said at least 91 Palestinians were killed in the strike and 300 injured.

Al-Mawasi is a designated humanitarian area that the Israeli army has repeatedly urged Palestinians to head to after issuing evacuation orders from other areas.

Reuters footage showed ambulances racing towards the area amid clouds of smoke and dust. Displaced people were fleeing in panic, some holding belongings in their hands.

The Israeli military published an aerial photo of the site, where it said “terrorists hid among civilians”.

The Israeli military official said the area was not a tent complex, but an operational compound run by Hamas and that several more militants were there, guarding Deif.

At ceasefire talks under way in Doha and Cairo, two Egyptian security sources said negotiations had been halted after three days of intense talks.

They cited the behaviour of Israeli mediators as revealing “internal discord”. Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas, said the group had been in contact with mediators in Egypt and Qatar as well as Turkey and Oman, and cited the attacks on Saturday, calling for an end to “these massacres against our people”.

Cape Times