Israel steps up military offensive in Gaza as US presses for ceasefire
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CAIRO – Israel announced a new military campaign on June 5 against Hamas in central Gaza and Palestinian medics said air strikes there had killed dozens of people ahead of talks between US and Qatari mediators to try to finalise a ceasefire deal.
The armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they had fought gun battles with Israeli forces in areas throughout the enclave and fired anti-tank rockets and shells as the two sides sought to gain the upper hand amid pressure to lay down their arms.
At least 44 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli military strikes
“The sounds of bombardment didn’t stop all night,” said Ms Aya, 30, a displaced woman in Deir al-Balah.
Two children were among the dead laid out on June 5.
Mourners said they had been killed along with their mother, who had been unable to leave when others in the neighbourhood did.
“This is not war, it is destruction that words are unable to express,” their father Abu Mohammed Abu Saif said.
The Israeli military said jets were hitting Hamas militant targets in central Gaza, while ground forces were operating “in a focused manner with guidance from intelligence” in the area of Al-Bureij – one of Gaza’s long-established refugee settlements.
“The forces of the 98th Division began a precise campaign in the areas of east Bureij and east Deir al-Balah, above and below ground at the same time,” an Israeli military statement said.
Residents said Israeli forces had sent tanks into Bureij and planes and tanks pounded the nearby settlements of Al-Maghazi and Al-Nuseirat as well as Deir al-Balah city, where tanks have not invaded.
“Every time they speak about new truce talks, the occupation uses one town or refugee camp as a pressuring card.
“Why should civilians, people safe inside their homes or tents, pay the price? Why can’t Arabs and the world stop the war?” Ms Aya asked Reuters via a chat app.
CIA director Burns discusses ceasefire in Doha
Ms Aya, like many in the Gaza Strip, said people held out hope that reported talks between officials from the US, Qatar and Egypt in Doha on June 5 would advance a ceasefire deal involving the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza and some of the Palestinians jailed in Israel.
Central Intelligence Agency director William Burns was meeting Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, an official briefed on the talks said.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters on June 4 that the administration was waiting for a response from Hamas through the Qatari mediators to a ceasefire proposal
Qatar said on June 4 that the proposal was now much closer to the positions of both sides.
Hamas has said it views the contents of the plan positively and has criticised Washington for what it described as attempts to blame the Palestinian militant group for hampering it.
But a spokesman for Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, reiterated on June 4 that it could not agree to any deal unless Israel makes a “clear” commitment to a permanent truce and complete withdrawal from Gaza.
Israel says it cannot do that until Hamas is wiped out.
US officials say that since it is an Israeli plan, Israel is likely to accept it. Qatar has said Israel needs to give a clear position on the plan that represents the whole government, parts of which have opposed any kind of truce.
Also on June 5, the Hamas-allied Islamic Jihad group said a delegation led by its leader Ziad al-Nakhala had arrived in Cairo for talks with Egyptian mediators on ways to “end the Zionist aggression on Gaza Strip and efforts to send aid”.
Fighting continued in Rafah, the town on the border with Egypt, which Israeli forces swept into in May in what the military said was a limited operation to root out Hamas’ last intact combat units.
“The forces found combat means and eliminated armed saboteurs who operated nearby and posed a threat,” it said.
Remaining residents in Rafah – from where most of the million people who had taken refuge there have fled again – said Israeli tanks mounted raids into the centre and deeper into the west before retreating east and south again.
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, issued a new plea for a ceasefire on June 5 on social media platform X, describing the lasting impact of almost eight months of war.
“The war in #Gaza has upended millions of Palestinian lives and caused catastrophic damage to the natural environment that they depend upon for water, clean air, food and livelihoods. Restoring environmental services will take decades – and cannot even start until a #ceasefire,” it said.
Israel vowed to destroy Hamas as it launched an air and ground offensive in Gaza in October after militants stormed across the border into southern Israel on Oct 7, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 people hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
About 120 hostages remain in Gaza.
The Israeli military campaign has killed more than 36,000 people in densely populated Gaza, according to its health authorities, who say thousands more bodies are buried under rubble. REUTERS
