Hamas believes peace talks will be a success despite Israel assassinating police chief overnight
Hamas remains upbeat about brokering a peace deal with Israel in their latest round of negotiations despite the Jewish state assassinating the terror group’s police chief overnight.
World
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A senior Hamas official believes a ceasfire could be imminent in Gaza as the designated terror group heads back to the negotiating table.
Mousa Abu Marzouk told the Qatari daily al-Araby al-Jadeed “there is a good chance that negotiations will succeed this time,” on Thursday as his delegation prepared to leave for Doha to resume talks.
His optimism may well be misplaced, however as the Israeli contingent is not expected to attend the talks in Qatar which will resume on Friday.
The comments come after Israel struck a declared humanitarian zone in southern Gaza overnight, which rescuers on Thursday said killed the head of the Palestinian territory’s Hamas-run police force, his deputy and nine others.
Gaza’s civil defence agency said two other Israeli strikes elsewhere in the territory later on Thursday killed 14 Palestinians.
The Israeli military confirmed it had carried out the overnight strike on the area of Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip, which it said targeted deputy police chief Hussam Shahwan over his alleged role in planning attacks against Israeli troops.
The civil defence agency said Shahwan was among 11 people killed in the strike, which according to the rescuers and authorities in Gaza also left the commander of the police force, Mahmud Salah, dead.
“Eleven people were martyred, including three children and two women, and 15 were injured after the (Israeli) occupation aircraft bombed a tent housing displaced people in the Al-Mawasi area, west of Khan Yunis city in the southern Gaza Strip,” said a civil defence statement.
Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for the agency, said the two senior police officers were among the dead.
The Israeli military, which has not commented on Salah’s death, said his deputy Shahwan “was responsible for developing intelligence assessments in coordination with... Hamas’s military wing” in attacks on Israeli forces in Gaza.
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AN INTENSITY NOT SEEN IN GAZA
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz warned Wednesday that Israel will step up its strikes in Gaza if Hamas keeps up its rocket fire at Israel.
“I want to send a clear message from here to the heads of the terrorists in Gaza: If Hamas does not soon allow the release of the Israeli hostages from Gaza … and continues firing at Israeli communities, it will face blows of an intensity not seen in Gaza for a long time,” Mr Katz said in a statement after visiting the Israeli town of Netivot, which was recently targeted by rocket fire from nearby Gaza.
Mr Katz’s comments came as Gaza’s civil defence agency said an Israeli air strike killed at least 15 people in the territory’s north on Wednesday, in what it called the first deadly attack of the New Year.
“The world welcomed the New Year with celebrations and festivities, while we witnessed 2025 begin with the first Israeli massacre in the town of Jabalia just after midnight,” agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.
“Fifteen people were martyred and more than 20 were injured” in the strike on a house where displaced people were living, he said.
The Israeli military said it was looking into the reported strike. Since October 6, the military has been conducting a major land and air offensive in northern Gaza, particularly targeting Jabalia and its adjacent refugee camp.
The military says it is an effort to prevent Hamas militants from regrouping there and it has killed hundreds of fighters, while rescuers in the area say thousands of civilians have died.
US HITS HOUTHIS IN YEMEN
The US military said its forces had hit Houthi targets in Yemen’s capital that the Iran-backed rebels used to attack American warships and commercial vessels.
The attacks were carried out by US navy ships and aircraft that also struck Houthi-controlled coastal regions of Yemen, the US Central Command (CENTCOM) said.
It also said US navy and air force aircraft had destroyed “seven cruise missiles and one-way attack UAVs over the Red Sea,” using an acronym for unmanned aerial drones.
“There were no injuries or damage to US personnel or equipment in either incident,” it said.
One witness in Yemen’s Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa reported several strikes in different locations.
Another reported raids on Sanaa on the Defense Ministry and having heard a powerful explosion.
Houthi spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam called the strikes “an American aggression” and “a blatant violation of the sovereignty of an independent state and a blatant support for Israel.” The rebels said earlier Tuesday that they had fired two missiles at Israel, hours after the Israeli military said it had intercepted a projectile launched from the country.
The Houthis control much of war-torn Yemen and have been firing missiles and drones at Israel, and at ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, in what they say is solidarity with Palestinians during the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.
NETANYAHU RETURNS AFTER SURGERY
It comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended a session in parliament on Tuesday after being discharged from hospital where he had undergone a prostate removal surgery over the weekend.
The surgery took place on Sunday, with Israel still at war against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip nearly 15 months since their unprecedented October 7, 2023 attack.
Netanyahu was seen speaking with politicians on Tuesday as they convened to vote on a bill related to budgetary proposals.
On Saturday, Netanyahu’s office said he had been diagnosed with a urinary tract infection caused by a benign prostate enlargement.
He underwent surgery at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Centre, which said he was “in good condition” after the operation.
In March Netanyahu underwent a hernia surgery, and in July last year, doctors implanted a pacemaker after a medical scare.
GAZA DOCTOR’S FAMILY WANT HIM RELEASED
Dr Hussam Abu Safia’s family is calling for his immediate release, as Israeli attacks on other Gaza hospitals continue.
GAZA HEALTHCARE SYSTEM NEAR ‘TOTAL COLLAPSE’
A United Nations report has found that Israeli strikes on and near hospitals in the Gaza Strip had left healthcare in the Palestinian territory on the verge of collapse.
The report by the UN human rights office said such strikes raised grave concerns about Israel’s compliance with international law.
“Israel’s pattern of deadly attacks on and near hospitals in Gaza, and associated combat, pushed the healthcare system to the brink of total collapse, with catastrophic effect on Palestinians’ access to health and medical care,” the UN human rights office said in a statement.
Its 23-page report, entitled “Attacks on hospitals during the escalation of hostilities in Gaza”, looked at the period from October 7, 2023 to June 30, 2024.
It said that during this time, there were at least 136 strikes on 27 hospitals and 12 other medical facilities, claiming significant casualties among doctors, nurses, medics and other civilians and causing significant damage to, if not the complete destruction of, civilian infrastructure.
The report noted that medical personnel and hospitals are specifically protected under international humanitarian law, provided they do not commit, or are not used to commit, acts harmful to the enemy outside their humanitarian function.
It found that Israel’s repeated claims that Gaza hospitals were being improperly used for military purposes by Palestinian groups “vague”.
“Insufficient information has so far been made publicly available to substantiate these allegations, which have remained vague and broad, and in some cases appear contradicted by publicly available information,” the report said.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk said Gaza hospitals had become a “death trap”. “As if the relentless bombing and the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza were not enough, the one sanctuary where Palestinians should have felt safe in fact became a death trap,” he said.
“The protection of hospitals during warfare is paramount and must be respected by all sides, at all times.”
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