 "A boy covers his face as he plays by throwing paper onto a burning pile of garbage in the streets in Gaza City. Buildings have been flattened, thousands have died since Israel began its war in Gaza against Hamas following the October 7, 2023 attack. AP")
It has been over a month since Israel has renewed its strikes on the Palestinian territory of Gaza. Yet another round of negotiations has ended in failure, with no deal having been signed.
Amid this, Qatar’s lead negotiator expressed dissatisfaction with the pace of truce talks in Gaza, according to AFP.
“We’re definitely frustrated by the slowness, sometimes, of the process in the negotiation. This is an urgent matter. There are lives at stake here if this military operation continues day by day,” stated Mohammed Al-Khulaifi on Friday (April 18).
Qatar, alongside the United States and Egypt, mediated a truce in Gaza between Israel and Hamas that took effect on January 19, largely halting over a year of conflict triggered by the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Palestinian militants led by Hamas.
The initial truce phase concluded in early March with both sides failing to come to agreement on subsequent steps.
Hamas has demanded negotiations for a second phase of the truce, aiming for a permanent end to the conflict as laid out in the January agreement.
Israel, seeking an extension of the initial phase, resumed air and ground attacks across the Gaza Strip on March 18 after previously having paused aid entry.
Late Thursday (April 16), Hamas indicated it would reject Israel’s latest proposal for a 45-day ceasefire, which included the release of 10 living hostages held by the Palestinian group.
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More Shorts“We’ve been working continuously in the last days to try to bring the parties together and revive the agreement that has been endorsed by the two sides,” the Qatari minister of state mentioned.
“And we will remain committed to this, in spite of the difficulties,” he added.
The war in Gaza broke out following Hamas’ October 7 attack, which resulted in the deaths of 1,281 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Israel’s military offensive since then has killed at least 51,157 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians, according to the health ministry. The UN considers these figures reliable.
With inputs from AFP