Middle East crisis live: thousands of Israelis demand Gaza ceasefire as Hamas team in Cairo for truce talks
Welcome to our latest live coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza and the wider Middle East crisis. Here’s a rundown on some of the key developments to bring you up to speed.
Thousands of Israelis protested around the country on Saturday, demanding the government accept a ceasefire agreement with Hamas that would see the remaining Israeli hostages brought home from Gaza.
Protesters in Tel Aviv chanted “war is not holy, life is”, with some people accusing the country’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, of aiming to prolong the war.
At a rally in Tel Aviv, that took place as Hamas officials were meeting Egyptian and Qatari mediators in Cairo, relatives and supporters of the more than 130 hostages still in captivity said anything possible had to be done to bring them home.
The protests, ahead of the Yom HaShoah Holocaust Remembrance Day on Monday, came as the war in Gaza nears the end of its seventh month amid growing international pressure to stop the fighting.
In other developments in the war:
Hopes of a ceasefire in Gaza rose as a Hamas delegation arrived in Cairo on Saturday to continue indirect talks, with what is believed to be a response to a new proposal, reportedly agreed by Israel to halt fighting for an initial 40 days and exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners. Egyptian and US mediators have reported signs of compromise in recent days and Egyptian state news channel Al-Qahera said on Saturday that a consensus had been reached in the indirect talks over many of the disputed points. But many analysts remain pessimistic after talks over five months that have frequently broken down. A senior Hamas source close to the negotiations told AFP there would be “a new round” of talks on Sunday.
Israeli forces killed five Palestinians in a raid in a village near the city of Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry and the Israeli military said on Saturday. Hamas confirmed that four of the men killed during the raid in Deir al-Ghusun village were from its al-Qassam armed wing. The Palestinian health ministry said their bodies had been taken by the Israeli military. The Israeli military said an officer from a special police unit was wounded in the operation it claimed targeted a Hamas cell responsible for numerous shooting and car bombing attacks.
Israel this week briefed the Joe Biden administration officials on a plan to evacuate Palestinian civilians ahead of a potential operation in Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population has sought shelter from Israeli bombardment elsewhere. The officials told the Associated Press that the plan detailed by the Israelis did not change the US administration’s view that moving forward with an operation in the southern Gaza city would put too many Palestinian civilians at risk.
Media in Lebanon reported several Israeli attacks in southern areas in the country, including ad-Dhahira and Kafr Kila, Al Jazeera reported.