According to the UN information, the food and drug stocks will soon go in the Gaza Strip after weeks of Israeli blockade of aid deliveries.
Hamas is ready to sign an agreement “for an exchange of prisoners (…) and for a five-year ceasefire”, said the Hamas representative in Cairo. In this context, all Israeli hostages still held in the Gaza Strip should be released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
The Hamas delegation held talks with Egyptian intermediaries during the day. For this purpose, a high-ranking Hamas representative announced on Friday that the delegation, led by Chalil al-Haija, would discuss the “vision of Hamas for an end to war” with the representatives of Egypt. On Saturday evening the delegation from Cairo left, as Hamas explained.
Hamas insists on international guarantees for ceasefire
Together with the USA and Qatar, Egypt had taught a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, which came into force on January 19. After the first phase of the ceasefire expired, Israel wanted to extend the first phase instead of reconciling the planned second phase with a long -term adjustment of the fights.
Hamas has repeatedly demanded that a new ceasefire agreement at the end of the war that broke out 18 months ago had to include the full deduction of the Israeli army and auxiliary deliveries for the Gaza Strip.
Israel can “return to the war at every partial agreement, but that cannot be done with a comprehensive agreement with international guarantees,” emphasized Hamas representative Mahmud Mardawi on Saturday. That is why his organization will “insist on guarantees regarding the end of the war”.
The high-ranking Hamas representative Osama Hamdan later confirmed that suggestions that “no comprehensive and permanent termination of the war” would not be considered. “We won't give up the weapons of resistance as long as the crew continues,” he said. In addition to the release of all hostages, Israel requires a disarmament of Hamas, in which it sees the crossing of a “red line”.
