Politics New mass demonstrations in Israel for Gaza deal

While Israel's army continues to take action against the Islamist Hamas in the sealed-off Gaza Strip, new mass demonstrations are taking place at home. At the main rally in the port metropolis of Tel Aviv and other protests in other Israeli cities, participants demanded an agreement with Hamas for the release of around 100 hostages. According to local media reports, the organizers spoke of 500,000 demonstrators in Tel Aviv alone.

"We must not sacrifice any more lives, we must not sacrifice them (the remaining hostages)," said the relative of a hostage shot dead by the Islamist extremists at the rally in Tel Aviv. "Their time is running out."

Grief and anger

Hamas terrorists killed Carmel Gat and another woman and four men with point-blank shots last week. The Israeli military found their bodies in a tunnel in Gaza, as it announced last Sunday. "The six would be here with us today if (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu had said yes to a deal," Gat's relative shouted into the crowd with grief and anger in her voice.

Hamas and other Islamist terrorist groups attacked southern Israel on October 7 last year, killing more than 1,200 people and taking around 250 others hostage in the Gaza Strip. The unprecedented massacre triggered the Gaza war. According to an Israeli count, 101 people are still being held by Hamas, although it is unclear how many of them are still alive.

The indirect negotiations for their release, in which the USA, Egypt and Qatar are mediating between the parties to the conflict, have been going round in circles for months without any results. The envisaged multi-stage agreement would also include an end to the war, the withdrawal of the Israeli military from the Gaza Strip and the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.

Negotiations to continue

Critics accuse Israel's head of government Netanyahu of torpedoing the conclusion of such an agreement with exaggerated demands - such as for the Israeli military to remain permanently in strategic locations in the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu governs in a coalition with far-right parties that reject any concessions to Hamas and threaten him with the collapse of the government alliance.

The head of the US foreign intelligence service CIA, William Burns, has announced further indirect negotiations. "We will present this more detailed proposal, in the next couple of days I hope, and then we'll see," Burns said at an event organized by the Financial Times newspaper in London. He usually heads the US delegation at the indirect negotiations, which usually take place in Cairo or Doha.

US head of delegation hopes for breakthrough

US media had already recently reported on a planned final proposal for an agreement. If both parties to the conflict fail to accept this again, it could mean the end of the negotiations, they said. According to Burns, the stakes are immeasurably high - also for the future and security of the entire Middle East region.

The necessary progress in the negotiations was ultimately "a question of political will", he said. He sincerely hoped that the leaders of both parties to the conflict would take the necessary tough decisions and make political compromises, said Burns.

More deaths in Lebanon

Meanwhile, the military clashes between the Israeli army and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah militia in Lebanon continue. During the night, sirens blared in the northern Israeli border town of Kiryat Shmona, as the Israeli military announced. In total, more than 50 shells were fired from Lebanon. The air defenses intercepted most of them. At least two shells hit the evacuated village of Kiryat Shmona and caused damage, the Times of Israel reported, citing the authorities. There were no casualties.

At least three people had previously been killed in an Israeli attack in southern Lebanon in the early evening, according to local authorities. The victims were civil defense workers, according to the Ministry of Health in the Lebanese capital Beirut. The Israeli military did not initially comment on the incident. Hezbollah claimed responsibility for several attacks on Israel throughout the day.

Since the beginning of the war in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Hamas, which is allied with Hezbollah, eleven months ago, there have been military confrontations between the Israeli army and the Lebanese Shiite militia in the border area between the two countries on an almost daily basis. There have been casualties on both sides - most of them members of Hezbollah. According to its own statements, the militia is acting in solidarity with Hamas.

SDA