CAIRO: A senior Hamas official said on Monday that the Palestinian group is prepared to release all Israeli hostages in exchange for a "serious prisoner swap" and guarantees that Israel will end the war in Gaza. Hamas left Cairo on Monday after negotiations with mediators from Egypt and Qatar — two nations working alongside the United States to broker a ceasefire in the besieged territory. "We are ready to release all Israeli captives in exchange for a serious prisoner swap deal, an end to the war, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and the entry of humanitarian aid," Taher al Nunu, a senior Hamas official, said.
However, he accused Israel of obstructing progress towards a ceasefire. "The issue is not the number of captives," Nunu said, "but rather that the occupation is reneging on its commitments, blocking the implementation of the ceasefire agreement and continuing the war". "Hamas has therefore stressed the need for guarantees to compel the occupation (Israel) to uphold the agreement," he added.
Israeli news website Ynet reported on Monday that a new proposal had been put to Hamas. Under the deal, the group would release 10 living hostages in exchange for US guarantees that Israel would enter negotiations for a second phase of the ceasefire. The first phase of the ceasefire, which began on January 19 and included multiple hostage-prisoner exchanges, lasted two months before disintegrating.
Efforts towards a new truce have stalled, reportedly over disputes regarding the number of hostages to be released by Hamas, with 58 people still held in the Palestinian territory. Pointing to those failed negotiations, Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it was against talks aimed at phased hostage releases. "The phases method wastes valuable time and jeopardises all of the hostages," the group representing relatives of hostages said. "We demand to choose the necessary, feasible and appropriate solution: ending the war and returning all the hostages together, in one immediate phase."
Meanwhile, the European Union on Monday announced a new three-year financial support package for the Palestinians worth up to 1.6 billion euros. The fresh aid pledge came just ahead of a meeting between Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Mustafa and EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg. "We are stepping up our support to the Palestinian people. EUR 1.6 billion until 2027 will help stabilise the West Bank and Gaza," EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas wrote on X.
The EU is looking to boost the Palestinian Authority (PA) as Israel has resumed its war in Gaza after a ceasefire largely put a halt to the fighting for two months. "This will reinforce the PA's ability to meet the needs of the Palestinian people in the West Bank and prepare it to return to govern Gaza once conditions allow," Kallas said.
Brussels — the biggest international donor to the Palestinians — said the package would include 620 million euros in grants for the Palestinian Authority. The funds will be linked to reforms on "fiscal sustainability, democratic governance, private sector development and public infrastructure and services", the EU said. The rest will be made up of 576 million euros in grants for projects aimed at helping economic recovery in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
An Israeli air strike on Sunday hit one of Gaza's few functioning hospitals, resulting in the death of a child according to the World Health Organization, as Israel warned it would expand its offensive if Hamas does not release hostages. Since the outbreak of war, tens of thousands of Gazans have sought refuge in hospitals, many of which have suffered severe damage in the ongoing hostilities. "A child died due to disruption of care" at the Al Ahli Hospital in northern Gaza after a strike, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X. "The emergency room, laboratory, emergency room X-ray machines and the pharmacy were destroyed," he added. "The hospital was forced to move 50 patients to other hospitals. 40 critical patients couldn't be moved." The blast left a gaping hole in one of the hospital's buildings, with iron doors torn from their hinges. — AFP
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