Hamas said on
Tuesday that it believes ceasefire talks have been productive enough for a
ceasefire to be agreed, but only if Israel does not impose further conditions.
Palestinians inspect the damage in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on
a school sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis in the southern
Gaza Strip 16 December 2024 (Mohammed Salem/Reuters)
“The Islamic
Resistance Movement, Hamas, confirms that in light of the serious and positive
discussions taking place in Doha today, under the auspices of the Qatari and
Egyptian mediators, reaching an agreement on a ceasefire and prisoner exchange
is possible if the occupation stops adding new conditions,” the group said in a
statement.
The comments
echo reporting from Monday by Middle East Eye that among the factors that led
to a breakthrough in the Cairo-based talks is last month’s ceasefire in
Lebanon, which provided a blueprint for a similar ceasefire in Gaza.
White House
National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby also told Fox News on Tuesday
that the deal is “getting closer”.
“We believe -
and the Israelis have said this - that we’re getting closer, and no doubt about
it, we believe that,” he said.
“But we also are
cautious in our optimism,” he added. “We’ve been in this position before where
we weren’t able to get it over the finish line.”
Israel’s war on
Gaza has killed more than 45,000 people, most of the population has been driven
from their homes multiple times and hundreds of thousands are at risk of
famine.
While the
Reuters news agency initially reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu was personally on his way to Cairo - suggesting that a deal was well
past the negotiation stage - Netanyahu’s office has now denied that claim, with
one Egyptian source telling Israeli newspaper Haaretz that no such visit had
been planned.
Any potential
deal likely involves significant concessions from Hamas, given the Israeli
assassinations of its senior military and political leadership, and Israel’s
incessant air strikes on Gaza for 14 months which have reduced much of the
strip to rubble and ash.
The proposal now
being discussed is not a permanent ceasefire, but a 60-day pause in
hostilities, officials have said.
Hamas will also
likely have to agree to Israel occupying the northernmost third of Gaza, which
has been cut off from the rest of the strip for nearly three months. The group
still maintains, however, that forcibly displaced Palestinians from the north
should have the right to return to their homes there.
For his part,
Netanyahu has refused to shift from his goal of “eradicating” Hamas from Gaza
and ensuring that it can never again govern the strip.
Military control
of Gaza
Israel’s defence
minister on Tuesday said its military plans to exercise indefinite control over
Gaza even after “defeating Hamas”.
In a post made
on X, Israel Katz said his government would “have security control over Gaza
with full freedom of action just as it did in Judea and Samaria”, using the
Israeli name for the occupied West Bank.
“We will not
allow a return to the reality of before 7 October,” he added.
His comments
came as Israeli daily Ynet reported that the military plans to maintain a
presence in areas it currently occupies to prevent displaced Palestinians from
returning to their homes in northern Gaza.
The report said
this meant that Israel was adopting the controversial "Generals'
Plan", also known as the Eiland Plan, which would leave the area’s
security under Israeli military control.
Human rights
activists and experts have warned against the Israeli assault in northern Gaza,
saying that it is “genocidal” and a “perversion of law”.
Ghada
Majadli
Dr
Saeed Joudeh, the only orthopaedic specialist in northern Gaza, was fatally
shot in the head by an Israeli quadcopter last Thursday while travelling
between Al Awda Hospital and Kamal Adwan Hospital.
According
to Gaza's Ministry of Health, Joudeh was hit directly and died from the injury.
He had previously been injured two weeks earlier. Joudeh regularly commuted
between the two hospitals to address severe staff shortages.
His
killing is not merely the loss of a single physician but a calculated act
within a broader strategy to incapacitate Gaza's healthcare system - critical
not only for treating injuries but for enabling the population to heal,
recover, and sustain resilience.
With
Joudeh's death, the number of medical sector staff killed has now reached
1,057, according to the Ministry of Health.
This
attack took place amid intensifying assaults on northern Gaza's healthcare
infrastructure, which form part of broader practices - such as starvation and
attacks on shelters - intended to achieve the "Generals' plan" of
depopulating northern Gaza.
Near-total
destruction
Kamal
Adwan Hospital, one of only three partially functioning facilities in the area,
has faced relentless attacks, including drone strikes, ground invasions, and
bombings.
In
one such assault, a 16-year-old patient, Mahmoud Abu al-Aish, was killed by a
drone strike while in his wheelchair, and at least 12 other people, including
medical staff, were wounded.
These
systematic attacks target both the material capacity of hospitals and their
symbolic role as spaces of recovery, survival, and hope amid destruction and
displacement.
The
assault on Joudeh occurred shortly after a senior prosecutor at the
International Criminal Court (ICC) stated that claims of Hamas fighters using
hospitals as bases "might have been exaggerated".
While
this statement challenges Israel's justification for targeting hospitals, it
fails to address the broader and more grave reality: the systematic dismantling
of Gaza's healthcare system and Israel's ability to carry out this destruction
with impunity for more than a year.
Israel's
deliberate debilitation of Gaza's healthcare system has taken many forms:
bombing facilities, killing and imprisoning healthcare workers, enforcing a
siege that cuts off essential supplies like water and medicine, and blocking
humanitarian missions.
These
actions are part of a broader strategy to create conditions intended to bring
about the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza as a collective group,
and ensure that Gaza's population remains unable to recover or rebuild -
inflicting long-term harm that extends far beyond immediate deaths.
Israel
frequently justifies these actions through the cynical misuse of the laws of
war, framing healthcare facilities and personnel as legitimate targets based on
unsubstantiated claims of military use.
This
narrative has facilitated the killing of patients, medical staff and civilians,
while preventing millions from accessing life-saving and essential healthcare
services by the near-total destruction of the healthcare system.
Silent
medical community
The
sacrifices of Gaza's medical personnel, who continue to serve despite
relentless assaults, underscore the profound social and political significance
of their work - a commitment to healing and caring for the population.
Israel's
systematic and unrelenting attacks aim to obscure and extinguish the last
remaining efforts of Gaza's doctors, fighting to save lives amidst the mass
killing.
While
healthcare providers in Gaza endure unimaginable threats, the responses - or
lack thereof - from fellow health workers and institutions globally reveal an
alarming failure of solidarity and ethical and professional obligations.
Within
Israel's medical community, it is not about a lack of solidarity or failure to
respond but rather open calls to destroy hospitals, coupled with widespread
indifference and the echoing of Israel's narrative that "securitises"
its violations of the protection granted to healthcare facilities and
personnel.
Meanwhile,
Palestinian healthcare providers are silenced and persecuted, stripped of
political agency and influence within the healthcare system.
The
global medical community has largely failed to respond meaningfully to the
systematic dismantling of Gaza's healthcare system.
Despite
overwhelming evidence of targeted attacks on hospitals, the killing of medical
personnel, and the obstruction of humanitarian access, alongside repeated calls
from the medical community in Gaza for global solidarity, the international
medical community has remained largely silent.
But
is solidarity enough at this stage?
By
failing to act decisively, the medical community legitimises these actions and
erodes the global protections designed to safeguard healthcare systems in
conflict zones.
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