Hamas seeks Gaza war end with truce, hostage exchange proposal

Israel has resumed its military campaign in the Gaza Strip, ending a two-month truce that had largely halted the fighting. Photo / AFP

• Hamas is open to a deal for a five-year truce and release of all hostages.
• Israeli strikes in Gaza killed at least 35 people, with food and medical supplies running out.
• The UN warns of severe shortages in Gaza, with the World Food Programme expecting to run out soon.

Hamas is open to an agreement to end the war in Gaza that would release all hostages and secure a five-year truce, an official said as the group’s negotiators held talks with mediators.

A Hamas delegation visited Cairo today to discuss with Egyptian mediators ways out of the 18-month war while, on the ground, rescuers said Israeli strikes in Gaza killed at least 35 people.

Nearly eight weeks into an Israeli aid blockade, the United Nations says food and medical supplies are running out in the territory.

The Hamas official, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said the Palestinian militant group “is ready for an exchange of prisoners in a single batch and a truce for five years”.

Hamas later said its delegation had left Cairo (today NZT).

New deal

The latest bid to seal a ceasefire follows an Israeli proposal Hamas rejected this month as “partial”. The new proposal calls instead for a “comprehensive” agreement to halt the war ignited by the group’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

The rejected Israeli offer, according to a senior Hamas official, included a 45-day ceasefire in exchange for the return of 10 living hostages.

Hamas has consistently demanded that a truce deal must lead to the war’s end, a full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and a surge in humanitarian aid.

An Israeli pull-out and a “permanent end to the war” would also have occurred – as outlined by then-United States President Joe Biden – under a second phase of a ceasefire that had begun on January 19 but which collapsed two months later.

Hamas had sought talks on the second phase but Israel wanted the first phase extended.

Israel wants all its hostages

Israel demands the return of all hostages seized in the 2023 attack, and Hamas’ disarmament, which the group has rejected as a “red line”.

“This time we will insist on guarantees regarding the end of the war,” Mahmud Mardawi, a senior Hamas official, said.

“The occupation can return to war after any partial deal, but it cannot do so with a comprehensive deal and international guarantees.”

Later, senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan reiterated that “any proposal that does not include a comprehensive and permanent cessation of the war will not be considered”.

“We will not abandon the resistance’s weapons as long as the occupation persists,” he said.

Attack continues

Israel pounded Gaza again today.

Mohammed al-Mughayyir, an official with the territory’s civil defence rescue agency, told AFP that the death toll had risen to at least 35.

In Gaza City, in the territory’s north, civil defence said a strike on the Khour family home killed 10 people and trapped an estimated 20 more in the debris.

Umm Walid al-Khour, who survived the attack, said family members, including children, were sleeping when the strike hit and “the house collapsed on top of us”.

Elsewhere across Gaza, 25 more people were killed, rescuers said.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the latest strikes but it said that “1800 terror targets” had been hit across Gaza since the military campaign resumed on March 18.

The military added that “hundreds of terrorists” were also killed.

Aid cut

Qatar, the US, and Egypt brokered the truce which began on January 19 and enabled a surge in aid, alongside exchanges of hostages and Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

With Israel and Hamas disagreeing over the ceasefire’s next phase, Israel cut all aid to Gaza before resuming bombardment, followed by a ground offensive.

Since then, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run territory, at least 2111 Palestinians have been killed, taking the overall war death toll in Gaza to 51,495 people, mostly civilians.

The Hamas attack that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1218 people on the Israeli side, also mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

Militants also abducted 251 people, 58 of whom are still held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

‘No food ... no flour or bread’

Israel says the military campaign aims to force Hamas to free the remaining captives.

On Friday local time, the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) said the hot meal kitchens it was supplying with food in Gaza “are expected to fully run out of food in the coming days”.

AFP footage showed queues of people waiting for food in front of a community kitchen.

“There is no food in the free kitchen, there is no food in the markets ... There is no flour or bread,” said north Gaza resident Wael Odeh.

A senior UN official, Jonathan Whittall, said Gazans were “slowly dying”.

“This is not only about humanitarian needs but also about dignity,” Whittall, head of the UN’s Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian affairs in the Palestinian territories, told journalists.

-Agence France-Presse