International pressure increased on Monday to obtain a truce in the Gaza Strip, where war has been raging between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas for more than ten months.
France, Germany and the United Kingdom have said “there can be no further delay” in negotiating a ceasefire in the besieged territory.
“The fighting must stop immediately,” the leaders of the three countries said in a joint statement, also calling for the release of the hostages taken to the Palestinian territory on October 7, the day of the Hamas attack on Israeli soil that triggered the war in the Gaza Strip.
The statements follow Hamas’s call on Sunday to implement the three-phase plan presented by US President Joe Biden in late May for a ceasefire in Gaza, “rather than conducting more negotiations or bringing new proposals.”
A few days ago, the mediating countries – Egypt, Qatar and the United States – had called for the resumption of talks on Thursday on a truce associated with the release of the hostages. Israel agreed, but Hamas has not clearly said whether it intends to participate.
On May 31, the American president announced a plan, presented as coming from Israel, providing, as a first step, for a six-week truce accompanied by an Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas of Gaza and the release of hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Air links suspended
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas, which seized power in Gaza in 2007 and which it considers a terrorist organization along with the United States and the European Union, after the attack on its soil killed 1,198 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data.
Of the 251 people abducted, 111 are still being held in Gaza, 39 of whom are dead, according to the army.
The Israeli retaliatory offensive in Gaza has left at least 39,897 dead, according to data from the Hamas-run Gaza government’s health ministry, which does not detail the number of civilians and fighters killed.
It has caused a humanitarian catastrophe in the Palestinian territory, where almost all of the 2.4 million inhabitants have been displaced.
The Israeli army announced on Monday the death of a soldier killed in fighting on Sunday, bringing to 330 the number of soldiers killed in the military campaign in the Palestinian territory since the start of the Israeli ground offensive on October 27.
Calls for a ceasefire have followed one another since the assassination in Tehran on July 31 of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, attributed to Israel, and the death on July 30 of Hezbollah military leader Fouad Chokr, killed in a strike near Beirut claimed by Israel.
Iran and its allies have threatened Israel with a “severe” response, raising fears of an extension of the war in the Middle East.
In this context, Lufthansa announced on Monday that it was extending its decision to avoid Iranian and Iraqi airspace until August 21 inclusive. Europe’s leading airline group also extended the suspension of its flights to Tel Aviv, Tehran, Beirut, Amman and Erbil until that date.
Air France and its subsidiary Transavia France have also extended the suspension of their connections to Beirut until Wednesday inclusive.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who sits in the occupied West Bank, is traveling to Russia on Monday to meet Vladimir Putin and discuss the situation in Gaza.
“Body in tatters”
On Sunday, the day after an Israeli raid on a school sheltering displaced people in Gaza City (north) considered one of the deadliest since the start of the war, Hamas called on mediators to “present a road map” to “implement” the plan “based on the vision” of Mr. Biden and “the resolutions of the UN Security Council.”
Continuing to discuss “gives cover” for Israeli bombings, he added.
In Gaza City, the identification of the bodies of the 93 Palestinians killed in the school strike continued on Monday. Gazan officials told AFP on Monday that 75 dead had been identified so far.
“The others have not been identified because some bodies are in tatters, others have been charred,” Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal told AFP.
The Israeli army, which has said the school was being used by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, said Monday that its strike had “eliminated” 31 fighters from the two armed Palestinian movements. A previous army report said “at least 19 terrorists” were dead.
This attack, the toll of which cannot be independently verified, has sparked an international outcry.