What to remember from Saturday, August 17

Fighting continues in the Palestinian enclave, where 15 members of the same family were killed by an Israeli strike on the night of Friday to Saturday, according to the Civil Defense.

Hamas has denounced the “American dictates”, Saturday, August 17, rejecting the new draft agreement for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, after more than ten months of conflict. Talks on a ceasefire in Gaza were held Thursday and Friday in Doha between Israel and the mediators, at the end of which a revised proposal for an agreement was presented by the United States, Israel’s main ally.

Fighting continues in parallel in the Palestinian enclave, where 15 members of the same family were killed by an Israeli strike on the night of Friday to Saturday, according to the Civil Defense. Here’s what you need to know from the day.

For Hamas, “to say that we are approaching a truce agreement is an illusion”

“To say that we are approaching a truce agreement is an illusion”denounced a senior official of the Palestinian Islamist movement, Sami Abou Zohri, in a statement to AFP on Saturday. “We are not facing an agreement or real negotiations, but rather the imposition of American dictates”denounced this member of the Hamas political bureau, responsible for the attacks of October 7 in Israel. The American president, Joe Biden, had affirmed Friday that an agreement had not “never been so close” for a ceasefire and the release of the hostages. Talks are due to resume in Cairo next week.

Hamas accuses Israel of adding “new conditions” to the text, among which the “troop maintenance” Israelis on the Gaza border with Egypt and “a right of veto” on Palestinian prisoners who could be exchanged for hostages.

“Cautious optimism” for Israeli negotiators

Israeli negotiators, returning from talks in Doha (Qatar) for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip accompanied by the release of hostages and prisoners, have “expressed their cautious optimism” to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister’s office reported on Saturday. “There is hope that the significant pressure from the United States and mediators on Hamas will help to lift its opposition to the American proposal,” Who “includes elements acceptable to Israel”.

Fifteen members of the same family killed by an Israeli strike, according to the Civil Defense

According to the Gaza Civil Defense, 15 members of a family, including nine children, were killed in an Israeli strike. All died in an airstrike on “their house and adjacent warehouses in al-Zawayda”said Gaza Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal, who identified the victims as belonging to the Ajlah family. Nine of them were aged between 2 and 17.

“At around 1:00 a.m., three missiles hit the house directly.”Ahmed Abu al-Ghoul, who was helping other Palestinians evacuate bodies from the rubble, told AFP. Asked by AFP, the Israeli army said it had “hit terrorist infrastructure in central Gaza Strip”asserting “investigate” after having “received information that civilians were killed in an adjacent structure”.

At least nine dead in Israeli strike in Lebanon

The Lebanese Health Ministry announced on Saturday that an Israeli strike in the Nabatieh area in southern Lebanon had killed ten Syrian nationals, including a woman and her two children. The strike, one of the deadliest in more than ten months of violence on the Israeli-Lebanese border between Lebanese Hezbollah and the Israeli army, also injured five people, two of whom are in critical condition, according to the ministry.

The Israeli army for its part explained that it had struck “a Hezbollah weapons warehouse” in the Lebanese region of Nabatieh, as well as “military structures” of the Islamist movement in the regions of Hanine and Maroun El Ras.

Hezbollah fired salvos of rockets at Ayelet HaShahar in northern Israel in response to the raid.