Israel’s Prime Minister Rejects Hamas’s Proposed Truce Terms on Gaza
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rejected Hamas’s proposed ceasefire terms – saying total victory in Gaza is possible within months.
He was speaking after Hamas laid out a series of demands in response to an Israel-backed ceasefire proposal.
Mr. Netanyahu said negotiations with the group were not going anywhere and described their terms as bizarre.
Netanyahu told a news conference on Wednesday, that if Hamas will survive in Gaza, it would only be a question of time until the next massacre.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told the Reuters news agency that Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks are a form of political bravado, and how he intends to pursue the conflict in the region.
An Egyptian official source told the BBC that a new round of negotiations, mediated by Egypt and Qatar, is still expected to go ahead on Thursday in Cairo.
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Around 1,300 people were killed during the Hamas attacks on southern Israel on 7 October last year.
More than 27,700 Palestinians have been killed and at least 65,000 injured by the war launched by Israel in response, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
Mr Netanyahu also confirmed on Wednesday that Israeli forces have been ordered to prepare to operate in the southern Gaza city of Rafah – where tens of thousands of Palestinians have fled to escape the fighting.
Expanding the conflict into Rafah would exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare in the city, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned.
We are afraid of the invasion of Rafah, one displaced person at the Rafah Crossing, near the border with Egypt, told BBC Arabic.
We sleep in fear and sit in fear. There is no food, and the weather is cold.
