The pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to strike a deal with Hamas to return hostages from the Gaza Strip after the death of six more hostages intensified yesterday, Monday with US President Joe Biden. to accuse him of not doing enough to achieve it. At the same time, Hamas published a video with a dead hostage asking Netanyahu for an agreement with Hamas for the return of the hostages. Meanwhile, Israel’s pounding of Gaza and Jabalia continues. At least eight Palestinians were killed yesterday while waiting in line for bread, according to the Palestinian Wafa news agency.
Video of Hamas hostage before he was killed
In particular, last night, Hamas released a video showing one of the hostages before she was killed.
The video shows the hostage, Eden Jerusalemi, whose body was among six recovered by the IDF over the weekend, in her final message asking Benjamin Netanyahu to make a deal.
“Benjamin Netanyahu and government of Israel do whatever is necessary to free us now. I suffer and we all suffer. The shelling does not stop and we fear for our lives. We are afraid we will die here,” she says in her last message.
He was referring to the 2011 swap deal Netanyahu brokered with Hamas, in which more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners were released in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
He also addressed her family, saying he loved them, and called on Israeli citizens to take to the streets to pressure Netanyahu to secure a deal that would bring the hostages back home.
“Benjamin Netanyahu: do what is necessary to release us now. The bombing here never stops and we are afraid for our lives.”
Eden Yerushalmi’s last message to Benjamin Netanyahu before being killed in a failed IOF rescue operation. #BringThemHome #BringThemAllHome pic.twitter.com/9RbdOSSbgD
— d (@palestannies) September 2, 2024
Nearly 11 months after armed conflict erupted in the Gaza Strip, triggered by an unprecedented Hamas raid into southern Israel on October 7, the warring sides exchanged fresh threats after the Israeli army recovered the bodies of six hostages from an underground tunnel in southern part of the enclave under siege.
Netanyahu’s apology
After publicly “apologising for not bringing back alive” the six hostages, Mr Netanyahu accused Hamas of “executing” them with “a bullet to the neck” and vowed the Palestinian Islamist movement would pay “very dearly”.
The threats of Hamas
Hamas, for its part, said that the hostages it continues to hold will be returned “in coffins” if Israel continues military pressure, “instead of concluding an agreement”, through the mouth of the representative of its military arm, Abu Ubaydah.
For his part, another Hamas official said that the hostages were “killed by Israeli fire.”
They were abducted and driven to the Gaza Strip in the October attack, which triggered a wide-scale Israeli operation in retaliation, killing tens of thousands and causing massive destruction in the enclave.
The mobilizations are intensifying
Now the mobilizations in Israel are intensifying: new demonstrations took place in various cities, a strike was announced that caused problems at Ben Gurion Airport, while statements openly demanding that Mr. Netanyahu leave office have multiplied.
“The Netanyahu government should cease to exist”
“We want the (Netanyahu) government to cease to exist, we want elections, above all we want an agreement to be signed to release the hostages and end the war,” Barak Khandourian, a protester in Tel Aviv, summarized to AFP.
At the funeral of Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Paulin, 23, Israeli President Isaac Herzog said he was devastated that “we couldn’t bring him home again.”
The negotiations are at an impasse
Despite international pressure and concerns about the risk of generalizing the war, spreading it throughout the region, months-long negotiations aimed at concluding a cease-fire agreement in the Gaza Strip that would be accompanied by the release of hostages remain deadlocked, with the warring parties to blame each other.
The biggest obstacle
Yesterday, Israel’s prime minister reiterated that he considers it necessary for his country to maintain control of the Gaza Strip-Egypt border corridor, an issue that has become a major obstacle in indirect negotiations.
After all, Benjamin Netanyahu keeps repeating that he will continue the war until Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, is destroyed, which Israel classifies as a terrorist organization, as do the US and the EU.
Biden: Netanyahu is not doing enough for a deal
The US, Israel’s main international ally, is also stepping up pressure on Prime Minister Netanyahu.
Before meeting with his envoys in the — fruitless — indirect negotiations of recent months, Joe Biden answered “no” when asked by a reporter if he thought Mr. Netanyahu was “doing enough” to strike a deal that would lead to the release of the hostages.
Mr. Biden also reiterated that he was “outraged at the killing” of the hostages and said it was important that “Hamas be held accountable.”
Britain cuts arms to Israel
For its part, the British government announced the suspension of some licenses to export military equipment to Israel, citing the “risk” that they would be used in the Gaza Strip, in violation of international law. Israeli government ministers expressed “disappointment” at the decision.
At least eight dead in an Israeli strike in Jabalia
However, Israeli shelling continued in the enclave, especially in Gaza City and Jabalia (north), where at least eight Palestinians were killed while waiting in line for bread according to the Palestinian Wafa news agency.
“Displaced persons had gone to buy essentials. They bombed little children, killed them! It goes a long way! Where are they going?’ screamed Wissam al-Omari, a resident of Jabalia, after yet another shelling by the Israeli army.
Several others were injured in the strike in front of the al-Fahura school and have been taken to Kamal Antoine hospital, the same report added.
“Colossal humanitarian needs”
The UN High Commissioner for the Near East, Tor Venesland, who visited the Gaza Strip yesterday, said he had found “colossal humanitarian needs”. The Norwegian diplomat at the same time “condemned the tragic killing of six hostages in Gaza by armed Palestinian organizations”.
At the same time, in the West Bank, a Palestinian area occupied by Israel since 1967, at least 26 Palestinians, most of them fighters of Palestinian movements, have been killed since last Wednesday, in the context of operations by the Israeli armed forces centered on the city of Jenin, according to the Palestinian Authority. The Israeli army maintains that all of them without exception were “terrorists”.
Source: APE-MPE – AFP- Xam;aw Al Jazeera, ertnews.gr
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