- Qatar is hosting Gaza ceasefire talks to halt the fighting
between Israel and Hamas. - Mediators from the US, Qatar, and Egypt are expected to
participate. - The situation is further complicated by regional
tensions, particularly the killing of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in
Tehran, which has led to fears of a wider conflict involving Iran and its
allies.
Qatar is set to host Gaza ceasefire talks on Thursday,
seeking a so-far elusive agreement that the United States hopes would stop Iran
striking Israel and avert a wider war.
US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators have invited Israel and
Hamas for negotiations aimed at ending fighting that the Hamas-run Gaza health
ministry says has killed nearly 40 000 people in the Palestinian territory.
The talks will be held in the Qatari capital Doha, a source
close to Hamas and a second source close to the negotiations said Wednesday.
According to a US source familiar with the Doha meeting, CIA
director William Burns is scheduled to take part.
Israel confirmed it would attend, though it remained unclear
if Hamas, whose 7 October attack on Israel triggered the war, planned to
participate.
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Mediation efforts have repeatedly stalled since a week-long
ceasefire in November – the only pause so far in the war – when dozens of
hostages were released by militants in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held
in Israeli jails.
A Hamas official said the Islamist movement was
“continuing its consultations with the mediators”, after demanding
the implementation of a proposal that US President Joe Biden laid out on 31 May,
instead of holding more talks.
The phased plan would start with an initial six-week
“complete ceasefire”, the release of some hostages held in Gaza and a
“surge” in humanitarian aid entering the besieged territory as the
warring sides negotiate “a permanent end to hostilities”, Biden said
at the time.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told several Middle
Eastern counterparts in recent days that “this ceasefire deal is of vital
importance, that we need to do everything we can to get it done, and that
escalation is in no one’s interest”, State Department spokesperson Vedant
Patel said on Wednesday.
The latest mediation push comes as regional tensions have
soared following the 31 July killing of Hamas political leader and truce
negotiator Ismail Haniyeh during a visit to Tehran.
Iran and its allies blamed Israel, which has not claimed
responsibility for the attack that Tehran and armed groups it backs in the
region have vowed to avenge, raising fears of a wider conflict more than 10
months into the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
‘No one knows’
Western leaders have urged Tehran to avoid attacking Israel
over Haniyeh’s killing, which came hours after an Israeli strike in Beirut
killed a senior commander of Hamas ally Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed
militant group in Lebanon.
Asked whether a ceasefire agreement in Gaza could stave off
a feared Iranian attack on Israel, Biden said: “That’s my
expectation”.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanani said
Tehran rejects Western calls “to take no deterrent action against a regime
which has violated its sovereignty”, referring to Israel.
Last week the Iranian mission to the United Nations
expressed “hope” that the retaliation would not be “to the
detriment of the potential ceasefire” in Gaza.
A spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
told AFP that the heads of the Mossad spy agency and Shin Bet secret service
would attend the Doha talks.
State Department spokesperson Patel earlier told reporters
that Qatar was “working to ensure that there is Hamas representation as
well”.
Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman
Al-Thani discussed in a phone call Wednesday with Blinken “joint mediation
efforts to end the war” and “the need for de-escalation”, the
Qatari foreign ministry said.
Both men said “no party in the region should take
actions that would undermine efforts to reach a deal,” according to a US
State Department readout of the call.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog said on social media platform
X that the country remained on “high alert” over “the
hate-filled threats of the Iranian regime and its terrorist proxies”.
‘We are all suffering’
Hamas’s unprecedented 7 October attack on southern Israel
resulted in the deaths of 1 198 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP
tally of Israeli official figures.
Militants also seized 251 people, 111 of whom are still held
captive in Gaza, including 39 the military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory military offensive in Gaza has killed
at least 39 965 people, according to the territory’s health ministry, which
does not provide a breakdown of civilian and militant deaths.
The Israeli military said it carried out dozens of air
strikes in the past 24 hours, and Palestinian civil defence rescuers reported
artillery shelling and aerial attacks across the Gaza Strip.
In Lebanon, the health ministry reported two killed in
separate Israeli strikes, the latest in near-daily cross-border violence
throughout the Gaza war. Hezbollah said two of its fighters were killed.
The Israeli military said its air force had “struck
Hezbollah military structures”.
Ambulances arrive at the scene as people gather following a reported Israeli drone attack in the main square of the southern Lebanese town of Marjayoun on 14 August 2024, amid ongoing cross-border tensions between Israel and Hezbollah fighters. (Rabih Daher / AFP)
Numerous governments have issued advisories against travel
to Lebanon and prepared contingency plans to evacuate their nationals from the
region if full-scale war breaks out.
The United States has deployed an aircraft carrier strike
group and a guided missile submarine to the region in support of Israel.
As part of de-escalation efforts, French Foreign Minister
Stephane Sejourne is set to visit Beirut Thursday, diplomatic sources said, on
the heels of a visit Wednesday by US envoy Amos Hochstein.
With negotiators planning to meet, Palestinian Ibrahim
Makhamer told AFP in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah: “We hope for the end of
the war.”
“We are all suffering,” said Makhamer, denouncing
“a policy of starvation” and shortages of medical supplies in the
territory, where the vast majority of its 2.4 million people have been
displaced at least once by the war.
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