Israel continues airstrikes on Gaza after Hamas says it is ready for ceasefire talks
Israel has continued to launch waves of airstrikes in Gaza, hours after Hamas said it was ready to start talk“immediately” on a US-sponsored proposal for a 60-day ceasefire.
The announcement by the militant Islamist organisation increased hopes that a deal may be done within days to pause the killing in gaza and possibly end the near 21-month conflict.
Saturday was relatively “calmer” after days of intense bombardment, aid officials and residents in Gaza said, although 24 Palestinians were killed, including 10 people seeking humanitarian aid, according to hospital officials.
Airstrikes struck tents in the Mawasi coastal area in southern Gaza, killing seven, including a Palestinian doctor and his three children, according to medics at a nearby hospital. Four others were killed in the town of Bani Suheila, and three people were killed in three different strikes in the town of Khan Younis.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) made no immediate comment on the attacks.
Israel’s security cabinet was due to meet after sundown on Saturday but officials in Jerusalem said there was “no guarantee” that ministers would make a decision on the Hamas response to the ceasefire deal.
Separately, two US contractors with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) were injured in the south of the territory after unknown assailants threw grenades at them at a food distribution site, the organisation said.
The GHF, a US-supported private organisation that began handing out food parcels in Gaza last month, has been mired in controversy, with the UN secretary general, António Guterres, saying it was “inherently unsafe” and that it was “killing people”. The GHF denies this, saying it has delivered tens of millions of meals in “safety and security”.
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