The armed wing of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas fired several rockets at the Israeli city of Tel Aviv, in an escalation of the conflict that international diplomacy tries to stop with new efforts to resume the negotiation of a truce.
Alarm sirens rang out in central Israel for the first time in months. Shortly after, the Ezedin al Qasam brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, stated on Telegram that they had attacked Tel Aviv “with“n a major barrage of rockets in response to the Zionist massacres against civilians.”
The Israeli army assured that at least eight rockets were fired from Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, where his forces are fighting Palestinian Islamist fighters. “Some rockets were intercepted,” he said.
Hours earlier, Israeli shelling and artillery fire had hit the north and center of the Palestinian territory, as well as Rafah, a city in the far south from which hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have fled.
The Gazan civil defense stated that recovered six bodies after an airstrike on a house in eastern Rafah, where Israel continues its military operations despite the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordering it on Friday to suspend them in this sector.
Israel-Hamas: international pressure for an agreement
After almost eight months of war, International and domestic pressure continues to mount for Israel to reach an agreement with Hamas that includes the release of the hostages which remain in the hands of the Islamist movement that has governed the Gaza Strip since 2007.
A senior official said the Israeli war cabinet plans to meet Sunday night to discuss efforts to free the hostages.
Another source assured on Saturday that the Israeli government has l“intention” to relaunch the negotiations “this week.”
The ICJ, the highest judicial body of the UN, also demanded the opening of the border crossing between Egypt and Gaza in Rafah, a gateway for humanitarian aid that Israel closed at the beginning of the month when it began its operations in the city.
Egypt, which refused to reopen the Rafah crossing as long as Israeli troops controlled the Palestinian side, announced on Sunday that it was allowing aid trucks to transit through the Israeli Kerem Shalom crossing, according to Al Qahera News.
In total, “200 trucks” left the Egyptian side of the Rafah border post to head towards Kerem Shalom, indicated this channel close to the Egyptian intelligence services, without specifying how many trucks passed the security checks to enter the territory.
Egypt also stated that it was continuing “his efforts to reactivate negotiations” indirect relations between Israel and Hamas, added Al Qahera News.
Indirect negotiations brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States stalled in early May, shortly after the start of Israel’s ground operations in Rafah.
Israeli media indicated that the head of Mossad – the intelligence service -, David Barnea, agreed during meetings in Paris with the director of the CIA, William Burns, and the Qatari prime minister, Mohamed bin Abdulrahman al Thani, a new framework for conversations.
US President Joe Biden said he was “committed to a emergency diplomacy” to try to achieve a ceasefire and the release of the hostages.
Qatari officials are scheduled to meet with a Hamas delegation in the coming days, according to the American news website Axios.
The conflict between Israel and Hamas
The war broke out on October 7, when Hamas Islamist commandos killed more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, in southern Israel, according to an AFP report based on official Israeli data.
The militants also kidnapped 252 people. Israel claims that 121 remain kidnapped in Gaza, of which 37 have died.
In response, Israel vowed to “annihilate” Hamas and launched an offensive against the Gaza Strip, in which 35,984 Palestinians have died so far, mostly civilians, according to the Ministry of Health of the Palestinian territory, governed by the Islamist movement.
in hisr, the Israeli army began ground operations in some sectors of Rafah on May 7where it claims to be the last bastions of Hamas, considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union.
Some 800,000 people have fled the city since that day, according to the UN, which warns of the catastrophic humanitarian situation throughout the Gaza Strip, with the risk of famine and hospitals out of service due to the Israeli siege.
Source: Ambito
