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  August wk3bis -- August wk3 P4 -- August wk3 P3 -- August wk3 P2 -- August wk3 -- August 2 P2 -- August wk2 -- August wk1 P2 -- August wk1 --  Click here for an overview by week in 2024
 

Special reports: TRIBUTES TO MOTHERS AND CHILDREN Shoroughs' family August 12, 2024: 'Part of me is missing': How Israel's war on Gaza tears spouses apart earlier stories: August 7, 2024: 'My children cry all day from the heat': Life in Gaza’s tent camps... and August 5, 2024: Shorough 'We have nothing left in this world, except our daughter': a young mother on life in Gaza... Alaa al-Nimer  and daughter Nimah July 28, 2024 "My baby girl was born on the street": A traumatic birth in Gaza

July 22, 2024 Ms. Maram Humaid: "A letter to my son: As you turn one today in Gaza, I feel joy and sorrow"  July 12, 2024 Noor Alyacoubi - "I'm fighting to keep my baby alive" and other stories Mothers and children: Boom-And again Boom Special report: July 12, 2024: Scorched Hospitals - Schools -  Housing - Bodies -- fake or fact?

August 17 - 16, 2024 <<Omar Assad's family says 'unjust' US decision will not end push for justice  and other news that most likely stands between a cease-fire

August 16 - 13, 2024 More than 40,000 Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza... and not to forget 2 baby-twins... but the women aren't going aywhere! and other news that most likely stands between a cease-fire

August 13 - 12, 2024 <<Exclusive: Al-Tabin attack 'deliberately timed to cause maximum casualties' Food for thought: which proves more than enough how animalistic the israelis interprete their view on warfare and more actual news Click here to go throughout August and earler, 2024

June 14, 2024 Palestinian-Jordanian journalist Hiba Abu Taha sentenced to one year in prison

Related news: August 12, 2024 Israel's "blatant act of intimidation and incitement" August 2 - July 21, 2024 Is Western journalism as envisioned dead and other stories   Click here for earlier stories/news

May 23, 2024 In commemoration of Roshdi Sarraj and tribute to Shrouq Al Aila

 
When one hurts or kills a women
one hurts or kills hummanity and is an antrocitie.
Gino d'Artali
and: My mother (1931-1997) always said to me <Mi figlio, non esistono notizie <vecchie> perche puoi imparare qualcosa da qualsiasi notizia.> Translated: <My son, there is no such thing as so called 'old' news because you can learn something from any news.>
Gianna d'Artali.

 France 25 - August 17, 2024
<<Hamas rejects Biden's optimism over ceasefire deal
Hamas's spokesman in Lebanon tells Sky News the US president is just trying to "keep everything sounding positive in the media" and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made things "more complicated" with further conditions. Joe Biden's optimism about an imminent Israel-Hamas ceasefire is just a bid to keep hostile powers calm and there have been "no improvements", a spokesman for the militant group has told Sky News. The US president told reporters on Friday he was <optimistic> and there are <just a couple more issues> that US, Qatari, and Egyptian negotiators have to resolve between the two sides. But speaking to Sky News' special correspondent Alex Crawford, Hamas's spokesman in Lebanon Dr Ahmad Abdulhadi said this was "not true". "The Biden administration is trying to show that the environment is positive. But the first round showed there are no improvements," he said. "The mediators told us that the disagreed points haven't been solved and [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu added more conditions on it and made it even more complicated." He said Mr Biden's claims were just to <keep everything sounding positive in the media> and <keep the Axis of Resistance calm and to stop it responding to the assassination and not slip into a regional war>.
The Axis of Resistance refers to the Iranian-led alliance between various Islamist groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah.
How strong is Iranian-backed Hezbollah?
Israel is believed to have killed Hamas's chief political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Iran last month, in what the group described as a <treacherous Zionist raid on his residence in Tehran>. Mr Netanyahu's office said it was <cautiously optimistic> about hopes of a ceasefire on Saturday. It added that it hopes heavy pressure on Hamas from the US and others will ease its stance on the American proposal and allow for a breakthrough.
The IDF claimed it struck a Hezbollah weapons storage facility, however the business owner has denied it.>>
Source:
https://news.sky.com/story/hamas-spokesman-refutes-bidens-optimism-over-ceasefire-deal-13198553

Sky News - August 6, 2024 - Dominic Waghorn International affairs editor
<<Inside Jit - the West Bank village where Israeli settlers burned homes and cars and killed one man
Palestinians in the West Bank village of Jit said that Israeli settlers came like a <paramilitary group> - armed and organised. In a picturesque hillside village, in the occupied West Bank, the latest victim of this conflict was being buried. Day trader, 23-year-old Mahmoud Abdel Qader Sadda was shot dead by Israeli settlers rampaging through his small community.
The village turned out to carry him to his grave.
Friday prayers were held before the funeral procession
Boys joined men waiting for the end of Friday prayers. Some wept and consoled each other.
The mood was one of shock and grief.
Jit is a peaceful village we were told, perched high on a West Bank hill it had till now felt aloof and remote from the region's deepening conflict.
Then the settlers came.
There's little dispute about what they did. Their every move seems to have been caught on CCTV cameras.
'What have we done to them?'
Outside one house, masked men doused furniture with fuel before setting it alight. Their prayer strings hung from under their jackets. Inside, the Arman family sat terrified. We found them today recovering. Their veranda was burned and sooty, in the middle of the wreckage a baby stroller sat a melted wreck.
Who are the Israeli settlers who attacked village?
The women of the house told us loudly what they thought of the men who came to visit last night. But eight-year-old Dima was the most expressive. "I was scared," she told us. "So scared. I was crying. All the children were. Why won't anyone protect us? It's wrong what these settlers are doing. They shouldn't act this way. What have we done to them? We mind our own business." There was no one to protect anyone here as the rampage continued. Across the village, another arson attack was underway also caught on camera. Settlers run around a car, smashing its windows before igniting a massive explosion. The Hyundai was owned by Hassan Arman. He seemed to seethe with a barely concealed fury as he spoke. What he said about the settlers was both revealing and repeated by others. "They're not just settlers. They are way past that now. This is a paramilitary group, dressed in uniform, with settlers' mentality. The attack was not random, it was carefully planned. The armed men were divided in an organised manner." Standing outside his mother's home, its interior blackened with soot, another man up the road repeated that claim. The intruders were organised like paramilitaries and well-armed. And he said they shouted to the villagers that they would force them to leave the West Bank and go to Egypt or Jordan. He claimed the settlers also said they had been sent by Itamar Ben Gvir. Ben Gvir is Israel's national security minister and a far-right Jewish extremist with a list of convictions for racism and membership of Jewish terrorist organisations. The Israeli government has condemned this attack, but since 7 October Israeli settlers have launched hundreds of them with almost total impunity. Critics will say as long as far-right extremists remain in the Israeli government, their supporters will be emboldened to carry out more of these attacks.
'The Israeli army didn't help'
The village is overlooked by an Israeli military outpost. The IDF says it sent troops into Jit to bring order as soon as the attack began. There is a military base nearby.>>
Source:
https://news.sky.com/story/inside-jit-the-west-bank-village-where-israeli-settlers-burned-homes-and-cars-and-killed-one-man-13197961

France 25 - August 17, 2024 - By Samuel Forey (Jerusalem, correspondent) and Helene Sallon (Beirut (Lebanon) correspondent)
<<Israel-Gaza negotiations: Washington steps up efforts to reach agreement
The US has presented a new draft text for the implementation of a truce between Israel and Hamas and to avoid a regional war. But there are still many stumbling blocks, and discussions are expected to continue in Cairo. The US administration has declared these negotiations to be <last chance.> The aim of the meeting in Doha, Qatar, on August 15 and 16 between the Israeli delegation and the American, Egyptian and Qatari mediators, was not only to relaunch talks on a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip after 10 months of war. It is now also to prevent a regional confrontation, by convincing Iran and the Lebanon-based Hezbollah organization to abandon their promised retaliation against Israel, following the targeted assassinations of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and Hezbollah top commander Fouad Shukur in Tehran and Beirut on July 31. Two days of talks ended on Friday with a declaration from mediators expressing cautious optimism. Washington had presented a new proposal for an agreement, aimed at <bridging gaps> remaining for implementation of a truce between Israel and Hamas. <We're closer than we've ever been> to an agreement, said US President Joe Biden. "We're not there,> he acknowledged, but said a compromise was <much closer than it was three days ago.> <We've made a lot of progress,> confirmed an American source close to the negotiations, who stated that the new proposal was based on the Biden plan, <with a few clarifications.> Presented on May 31, this plan provides for an initial six-week truce, accompanied by Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas of Gaza and the release of some of the 115 hostages still held by Hamas in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. The White House is hoping to conclude an agreement before the end of next week. A meeting has been scheduled in Cairo, Egypt, to continue discussions, particularly of a technical nature, with the aim of reaching a final agreement. Hamas, which has been kept informed of the progress of discussions, has already responded that the American proposal contains <new conditions> from Israel which it rejects.
"To say that we are approaching a truce agreement is an illusion," said Sami Abou Zouhri, a senior Hamas official, in a statement to French news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Saturday, August 17, denouncing the "imposition of American diktats."
Hamas under enormous pressure
Among the stumbling blocks, one of its officials cited the continued presence of Israeli troops along Gaza's border with Egypt, on the Philadelphia Route. Benjamin Netanyahu introduced this requirement at the end of July, in order to prevent arms smuggling with Egypt, although the Israeli military itself claims that their presence is no longer necessary.>>
Read more here:
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2024/08/17/israel-gaza-negotiations-washington-steps-up-efforts-to-reach-agreement_6717405_4.html


mpox virus
Jinha - Womens News Agency 16 August 2024
<<WHO calls to tackle mpox virus together
After Sweden reported the first case of highly infectious mpox virus, formerly monkeypox, outside Africa, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, called on the affected countries to tackle the virus together.
News Center- After Sweden reported the first case of highly infectious mpox virus, formerly monkeypox, outside Africa, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), called on the affected countries to tackle the virus together. "Identification of the first mpox clade 1b infection in Sweden underscores the need for affected countries to tackle the virus together," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization, said Friday on social media platform X. "We encourage all countries to enhance surveillance, share data, and work to better understand the transmission; share tools like vaccines; and apply lessons learned from prior public health emergencies of international concern in addressing the current outbreak." >>
Source:
https://jinhaagency.com/en/actual/who-calls-to-tackle-mpox-virus-together-35544

Al Jazeera - August 16, 2024 - by By Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
<<Omar Assad's family says ‘unjust’ US decision will not end push for justice
Relatives slam the US government for continuing to fund the Israeli army unit involved in an elderly Palestinian American man's killing. But more than that, the Palestinian American said his first reaction to the United States government's decision to continue funding an Israeli army unit that bound his elderly uncle and left him for dead could be summed up in a single word: "devastation". We see this [as] hypocrisy - a US government that allows a foreign entity to have this opportunity to kill," Assad, 36, told Al Jazeera in a phone interview from his home in the state of Wisconsin. "They murdered my uncle in cold blood. My uncle was not armed, was not...," he continued, his voice trailing off. "He was just going home from a night with his friends, his cousins, playing a card game." Omar Assad, a 78-year-old Palestinian American, died in January 2022 after he was detained by Israeli soldiers at a checkpoint in his home village of Jiljilya, near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. He was forced out of his car and then gagged, blindfolded and dragged on the ground, according to witness accounts and his family. He became unresponsive, and the soldiers left him out in the cold at a construction site without any assistance or medical care. An autopsy later found that he had died of a heart attack "due to the external violence he was exposed to". His death prompted widespread condemnation, and the Assad family and Palestinian rights advocates in the US have called on President Joe Biden's administration to conduct an independent investigation and ensure Israel is held accountable. Those calls grew louder after the Israeli army said in 2023 that soldiers involved in the incident had been disciplined but none would face criminal charges. In April of this year, the US State Department said it was looking into whether to sanction the Israeli military battalion that had detained Omar Assad - the Netzah Yehuda Battalion - which is notorious for abuses in the West Bank. But last week, the department said Secretary of State Antony Blinken had determined that issues with Netzah Yehuda had been <remediated> - and the unit could continue receiving US government funding. "My cousins and my uncle's wife don't want to speak to the media. They are just distraught, and they don’t want to be around any of this because it's unbelievable," said Assad, Omar's nephew. "It's unjust. It's just hypocrisy."
Pattern of impunity
The Biden administration's decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda comes amid a surge in Israeli military and settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank under the shadow of the country's war in the nearby Gaza Strip.
Nearly 600 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and settlers in the West Bank between the start of the Gaza war on October 7 and August 12, according to the latest figures from the United Nations humanitarian affairs office (OCHA).
But Palestinians in the occupied territories have faced decades of Israeli state violence.
They also have come up against what rights groups describe as a system of "endemic impunity" for soldiers and settlers involved in attacks against Palestinians. Omar Assad was not the first - or the only - American citizen killed by Israeli soldiers who later evaded criminal charges. Just months after the 78-year-old's killing, in May 2022, the Israeli army fatally shot renowned Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in the northern West Bank city of Jenin.

Shireen Abu Akleh
In another recent case, in January of this year, 17-year-old Tawfiq Ajaq, who was born and raised in the US, was killed in the West Bank village of al-Mazra'a ash-Sharqiya when an off-duty Israeli police officer and an Israeli settler opened fire. Both families are still seeking justice and accountability for the killings of their loved ones.
Ahmad Abuznaid, executive director of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, said, "It's frustrating to see the United States not only have a lack of care for Palestinians, a lack of care for international law, but an unwillingness to enforce US law." The US Leahy Law, for example, prohibits assistance to foreign military units that commit abuses. Abuznaid told Al Jazeera there is a double standard at play in American foreign policy: The US government only reserves full-throated outrage for anti-Israeli actions, but not anti-Palestinian ones. "When the Israelis commit a whole genocide [in Gaza], when they kill Shireen Abu Akleh or Omar Assad, the United States is concerned. When the Israelis can point to something that the Palestinians have done, it's immediately condemned," he said. That difference signals that "the US government views Palestinian people as disposable", Abuznaid added. "Their foreign policy has been shaped around an all-out support for Israel, no matter what. And this clearly puts US foreign policy at odds with Palestinians who bear the brunt of Zionism and are currently bearing the brunt of the US-Israel war machine's genocide."
'Palestinian lives do not matter'
That's a feeling shared by many who knew Omar Assad personally.
Othman Atta is the executive director of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, the US city where the 78-year-old had lived with his family for many years before retiring in Jiljilya. A lawyer by profession, Atta said he helped Omar with his family businesses. Atta also would see him at social events in the Milwaukee area, which is home to many families whose roots go back to Jiljilya. Atta said the US government's decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda sends a clear message "that in the eyes of the US government and US officials, that Palestinian lives do not matter, even if they happen to be carrying US citizenship".
That, coupled with Washington's unwavering military and diplomatic backing of Israel after 10 months of a devastating war in Gaza, has shaken him.
"We actually see a genocide taking place. We see people are being starved. They are being denied water. They are being bombed into oblivion [with] no regard for any human life," Atta told Al Jazeera. "And yet we cheer [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu in Congress. We send billions of dollars in aid," he said. "It's very difficult to fathom the depths of hypocrisy, of hatred against Palestinians and innocent people in Gaza. It really shakes you to the core."
'We need to find justice'
The US State Department did not respond by publication time to Al Jazeera's request for comment on the decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda, or to criticism that the move fails to ensure accountability in Omar Assad's death. In a statement shared by media outlets last Friday, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington had reviewed information provided by Israel and determined that violations by the unit had <been effectively remediated>. As a result, under US law, Netzah Yehuda could continue receiving assistance, Miller said.
But for Assad Assad, Omar's nephew, the decision is not the end of his family's push for justice. He described his uncle as a serious man who at the same time would never pass up a chance to joke around and make everyone laugh. "He was serious, but he was always funny with everything he did," Assad told Al Jazeera. "He was a good man that raised a large family. He has grandchildren and sisters and brothers that loved him dearly. His nephews all missed him," he added.
"We need to find justice for my uncle."
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA>>
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/8/16/omar-assads-family-says-unjust-us-decision-will-not-end-push-for-justice

Al Jazeera - August 16, 2024
<<Gaza records first polio case as UN calls for truce to tackle virus
Hamas says it supports UN request to halt the fighting to allow a vaccination campaign for children against polio.
'The ultimate vaccine for polio is peace and an immediate humanitarian ceasefire,' United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says
The Health Ministry in Gaza has said that it detected the first polio case in the besieged enclave, hours after United Nations officials called for a pause in the fighting to enable a vaccination campaign for children against the virus. In a statement on Friday, the Health Ministry blamed the "difficult" conditions in Gaza - including the spread of sewage water in the streets, shortages of medical supplies and lack of personal hygiene products due to the Israeli blockade - for the emergence of the virus in the territory. Hours earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had called for humanitarian pauses in the war in Gaza to conduct a polio vaccine campaign. "It is impossible to conduct a polio vaccination campaign with war raging all over," he told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York. Guterres appealed for assurances of humanitarian pauses to be provided immediately from the warring parties as he warned that preventing and containing the spread of polio in Gaza would take a massive coordinated and urgent effort. "Let's be clear: The ultimate vaccine for polio is peace and an immediate humanitarian ceasefire," Guterres said. "But in any case, a polio pause is a must." The UN chief added that the organisation is poised to launch a polio vaccine campaign in Gaza for children under the age of 10, but he said the "challenges are grave".
At least 95 percent vaccination coverage will be needed during each of the two rounds of the campaign to prevent polio’s spread and reduce its emergence, given the devastation in Gaza, Guterres said. He noted that a successful campaign would require the facilitation of transport for vaccines and refrigeration equipment at every step, the entry of polio experts into Gaza, as well as reliable internet and phone services. According to the UN agency for children (UNICEF), the vaccination will be administered in two rounds and is expected to be launched at the end of August and September this year across the Gaza Strip. The Health Ministry in Gaza also said the vaccination campaign cannot be successful without a ceasefire that would allow medical teams to access people freely across the territory. "We stress that the vaccination campaign will not be sufficient without comprehensive solutions to the issues of sewage and the accumulation of garbage between the tents of displaced people, and providing drinkable water and ending the aggression," it said. "The Health Ministry stresses that the spread of this virus will not stop at Gaza's borders, and the international institutions and relevant sides must take the necessary steps to end its spread inside and outside Gaza."
Hamas had said it supports the UN request for a humanitarian pause to vaccinate children against polio.
"Hamas also demands the delivery of medicine and food to more than two million Palestinians trapped in the Gaza Strip," Izzat al-Rishq, a member of the group's political bureau, said in a statement. In July, Gaza's Health Ministry declared a polio epidemic in Gaza and blamed Israel’s military offensive in the enclave as the reason behind the spread of the deadly virus. The Israeli military said in July it had already begun vaccinating its soldiers against the disease. Polio has been detected in wastewater in Gaza’s Deir el-Balah and Khan Younis governorates, Dr Hamid Jafari, a World Health Organization (WHO) polio specialist, said earlier this month. Without proper health services, the population of Gaza is particularly vulnerable to outbreaks of disease, public health officials and aid groups have said. Israel has restricted humanitarian groups’ access to Gaza, and Israeli forces have bombed aid convoys, killing dozens of aid workers. Moreover, the Israeli offensive has put most of Gaza's hospitals out of commission and the repeated displacement of Palestinians, who continue to face evacuation orders by the Israeli military, makes it difficult to locate and reach unvaccinated children. Dr Tanya Haj-Hassan, a paediatric intensive care physician, told Al Jazeera last month that the presence of the virus in sewage was a "ticking time bomb". Normally, if you have a case of polio, you're going to isolate them, you're going to make sure that they use a bathroom that nobody else uses, make sure that they’re not in close proximity to other people, [but] that's impossible," she said. "You have everybody clustering in refugee camps at the moment without vaccines for at least the past nine months, including children who would otherwise have been vaccinated for polio and adults who, in the setting of an outbreak, should receive a booster, including healthcare workers," she added.
Poliomyelitis, which is spread mainly through the fecal-oral route, is a highly infectious virus that can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis.
Children under the age of five, are most at risk from the viral disease, and especially infants under two, since normal vaccination campaigns have been disrupted by 10 months of conflict.
SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES>>
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/8/16/un-chief-calls-for-polio-pause-in-gaza-war-to-tackle-virus

France 25 - August 16, 2024 - OP-ED Julia Grignon | Samer Moussa
<<Hamas says ceasefire must include complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza as talks begin in Doha
The Palestinian group has demanded the implementation of a ceasefire plan and prisoner-hostage swap as laid out on May 31 by US President Joe Biden. International mediators held a new round of talks on Thursday, August 15, aimed at halting the Israel-Hamas war and securing the release of scores of hostages, with a potential deal seen as the best hope of heading off an even larger regional conflict. The United States, Qatar and Egypt met with an Israeli delegation in Qatar as the Palestinian death toll from the more than 10-month-old war climbed past 40,000, according to Gaza health authorities. Hamas, which didn't participate directly, accuses Israel of adding new demands to a previous proposal that had US and international support and to which Hamas had agreed in principle. White House National Security spokesperson John Kirby called the talks an important step and said they're expected to run into Friday. He said a lot of work remains given the complexity of the agreement and that negotiators were focusing on its implementation. A ceasefire in Gaza would likely calm tensions across the region. Diplomats hope it would persuade Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah to hold off on retaliating for the killing of a top Hezbollah commander in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut and of Hamas' top political leader in an explosion in Tehran. Kirby said that Iran has made preparations and could attack soon with little to no warning and that its rhetoric should be taken seriously.
Three-phase plan
The mediators have spent months trying to hammer out a three-phase plan in which Hamas would release scores of hostages captured in the October 7 attack that triggered the war in exchange for a lasting ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Both sides have agreed in principle to the plan, which President Joe Biden announced on May 31 . But Hamas has proposed "amendments" and Israel has suggested <clarifications,> leading each side to accuse the other of making new demands it can't accept.
Gaps remain even after months of talks
Hamas has rejected Israel's latest demands, which include a lasting military presence along the border with Egypt and a line bisecting Gaza where it would search Palestinians returning to their homes to root out militants. Hamas spokesperson Osama Hamdan told The Associated Press that the group is only interested in discussing the implementation of Biden's proposal and not in further negotiations over its content. A Palestinian official who closely follows the negotiations said Hamas wouldn't take part in Thursday's talks, but that its senior officials, who reside in Qatar, were ready to discuss any proposals from the mediators, as they have in past rounds. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denies that Israel has made new demands, but he has also repeatedly raised questions over whether the ceasefire would last, saying Israel remains committed to <total victory> against Hamas and the release of all the hostages.
Complex talks
The most intractable dispute has been over the transition from the first phase of the ceasefire - when women, children and other vulnerable hostages would be released - and the second, when captive Israeli soldiers would be freed and a permanent ceasefire would take hold. Hamas is concerned that Israel will resume the war after the first batch of hostages is released. Israel worries that Hamas will drag out the talks on releasing the remaining hostages indefinitely. Hamdan provided documents showing Hamas had agreed to a US bridging proposal under which talks on the transition would begin by the 16th day of the first phase and conclude by the fifth week.
More recently, Hamas has objected to what it says are new Israeli demands to maintain a presence along the Gaza-Egypt border and a road dividing northern and southern Gaza. Israel denies these are new demands, saying it needs a presence along the border to prevent weapons smuggling and that it must search Palestinians returning to northern Gaza to ensure they aren't armed. The demands were only made public recently. Hamas has demanded a full Israeli military withdrawal, which was also part of all previous versions of the ceasefire proposal, according to documents shared with the AP that were verified by officials involved in the negotiations. On Thursday, US State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel said that the broader framework of the deal laid out by Biden in May has generally been accepted and that the negotiation was a process, which was expected to continue.
Le Monde with AP>>
Source:
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2024/08/16/hamas-says-ceasefire-must-include-complete-israeli-withdrawal-from-gaza-as-talks-begin-in-doha_6716433_4.html

BBC - August 16, 2024 - By Robert Greenall
<<Risk of regional war hangs over Gaza ceasefire talks
The number of Palestinians reported killed in the war between Israel and Hamas has surpassed 40,000
If the leaks to local papers are true, even Israel's defence chiefs are urging Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to make a deal and agree a ceasefire in Gaza. Since Israel's negotiators last made the trip to the Qatari capital for talks, the stakes - and the pressures - have only grown. In Israel, the relatives of hostages still held in Gaza are calling this the <last chance> to get some of them out alive.
In Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry - whose figures have been used by the UN and Israel in the past - says the number of people killed in Israeli operations there since the war began has now passed 40,000.
And the US is moving a second aircraft carrier and a missile-equipped submarine to the region, after threats from Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, to attack Israel in response to the assassinations of key Hamas and Hezbollah leaders last month.
There is no lack of incentives for a deal.
And no lack of pressure either. The US believes a truce in Gaza could help calm the entire region.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has denied that he added new conditions to earlier ceasefire proposals
Visiting Lebanon on Wednesday, US envoy Amos Hochstein said a deal would also help create the conditions for a deal in a growing cross-border conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. <We have to take advantage of this window for diplomatic action and diplomatic solutions,> he said. <That time is now.> His boss, President Joe Biden, appears to be managing expectations. <It's getting harder,> he told reporters in New Orleans this week, adding, <I'm not giving up.”
With so much to gain, why are hopes for these talks so thin?
First, the red herring: the declaration by Hamas that it would not send a delegation to the meeting is unlikely to have a major impact.
Negotiations have always been indirect, shuttle diplomacy - Hamas representatives do not talk directly to Israel or the US. And the group's main international base is Doha, where talks are taking place, and where Qatari and Egyptian negotiators have an open channel of communication with them.
Hostages' families have told Israel's negotiators not to return without a deal
The real issue, according to former Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin, is a lack of motivation by the Israeli and Hamas leaders.
"The United States, Egypt and Qatar have decided that they need to change the rules of the game: put an ultimatum on the table, put a bridging proposal on the table, and tell Hamas and Israel that they have to do it," he said. "[But] it's obviously that the mediators want the agreement more than the parties do, and that's a big part of the problem."
Chen Avigdori's wife and 12-year-old daughter were among the 251 people kidnapped by Hamas in the 7 October attacks on Israel, when another 1,200 people were killed. The pair were released in November and he’s now campaigning to get the remaining 111 hostages out. "I think they are both holding it up," he said. "I think Sinwar doesn't really care about his own people. But I think that Mr Netanyahu has skipped some opportunities that Israel already had to sign the deal." Yahya Sinwar was elected Hamas's political leader following the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran
For Yahya Sinwar - one of the masterminds of the 7 October attacks, who became Hamas's political leader following Ismail Haniyeh’s assassination in Tehran - some analysts believe the calculation may be changing.
<I think Sinwar wants to save himself and save Hamas, because they haven't been destroyed totally, but militarily they've been defeated and it could turn into a rout,> said Chuck Freilich of Israel's Institute for National Security Studies. <Netanyahu is in a more difficult position, because if there's a deal, there's a very good chance that he'll lose his coalition.> Benjamin Netanyahu has so far held fast to certain red lines - including giving Israel the right to restart the war if later talks on troop withdrawal and prisoner exchanges fail. Mr Netanyahu's far-right allies have vowed to pull out of the government if, for example, he agrees to release large numbers of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails, in return for the hostages.
Israeli ground forces are continuing operations in central and southern Gaza
The sticking points facing negotiators are substantial. But proposals to bridge some of them have been widely reported in the Israeli media.
For instance, Mr Netanyahu’s insistence that Israeli forces must remain on Gaza’s border with Egypt, to stop armed groups smuggling in weapons, has been countered with solutions involving technology and the involvement of allies on the ground. Hamas has accused Israel of bringing in new demands and said that the time for negotiation is over. It has said it is ready to implement the terms it agreed to last month. Israel denies it is adding new conditions, describing them as an attempt to clarify what was already agreed. The deal's international mediators - the US, Qatar and Egypt - certainly have some leverage over the two sides, but it may not be enough to force an agreement if the parties themselves don't want one.
<The US and Qatar can push, they can cajole, they can offer inducements, they can offer to help create the technical solutions,> says Chuck Freilich. <But in the end, it's up to the specific leaders.>
Ultimately, the fate of these talks, of Gaza, of the hostages - even the fate of the region itself - will rest on the calculations of two shrewd survivors; two warring men.>>
Source:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20rxr3pr50o

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