Hamas plans to release 70 hostages in exchange for a five-day truce

Hamas has told Qatari mediators it is willing to release up to 70 women and children held in the Gaza Strip in exchange for a five-day truce with Israel.

They also call for the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

“Last week, the Qatari brothers attempted to release enemy captives,” women and children, “in exchange for the release of 200 Palestinian children and 75 women held by the enemy,” said Abu Ubaidah, a spokesman for the armed wing. Hamas, Al-Qassam Brigades.

The statement was published in an audio recording posted on the group’s Telegram channel.

“The truce must include a complete ceasefire and allow humanitarian assistance and assistance throughout the Gaza Strip,” he said.

He also accused Israel of “delaying and circumventing” the agreement.

Photo: Reuters.

Israeli tanks approach the gates of Gaza’s main hospital

Strengths IsraelThey arrived Monday at the gates of Gaza City’s main hospital, the main target of their fight for control of the northern half of the Gaza Strip, where doctors say patients, including newborns, are dying due to fuel shortages. .

Gaza Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Kidra, who was at Al-Shifa Hospital, said 32 patients, including three newborns, had died over the past three days as a result of the siege of the complex and the lack of electricity.

At least 650 patients were still inside, desperately trying to evacuate them to another medical center by the Red Cross or some other neutral agency. Israel claims the hospital is located above tunnels that house Hamas militants who use patients as shields, which Hamas denies.

“Tanks are standing in front of the hospital. We have a total quarantine. This is an absolutely civilized area. Only hospital facilities, hospital patients, doctors and other civilians remain in the hospital. Someone has to stop this,” surgeon Ahmed El Mokhallati said by phone.

“They bombed the (water) reservoirs, they bombed the water wells, they also bombed the oxygen pump. They bombed the entire hospital. So we barely survived. We are telling everyone that the hospital is no longer a safe place to treat patients. “We are harming patients by keeping them here,” he added.

Photo: Reuters.

There have also been renewed fears that the war will spread beyond the Gaza Strip, with fighting escalating along Gaza’s northern border. Israel with Lebanon, as well as US airstrikes against Iranian-linked militia targets in neighboring Syria.

Israel last month launched a campaign to destroy Hamas, the militant group that rules the Gaza Strip and has staged an incursion into the southern Gaza Strip. Israel As a result of which, according to estimates, about 1,200 people were killed and 240 were taken to Gaza as hostages. Israelon the deadliest day in its 75-year history.

Since then, thousands of Gazans have died and two-thirds of the population has been left homeless by a ruthless military campaign. IsraelHey. Israel ordered the complete evacuation of the northern half of the Gaza Strip. Gaza medical authorities say more than 11,000 people have died, about 40% of them children.

Since the ground forces IsraelThe fighting centered around al-Shifa, the enclave’s largest hospital.

Gaza Ministry of Health spokesman Kidra said the tank IsraelI parked at the hospital door. Snipers and drones IsraelThey fired at the hospital, preventing doctors and patients from moving.

“We are under siege and in a circle of death,” he said.

Reuters.

Source: Aristegui Noticias

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