Talks between the United States, Egypt, Israel and Qatar on a possible truce in Gaza ended without progress as calls grow for Israel to stop its planned assault on the southern tip of the enclave, where more than a million Palestinians are now displaced.
In Cairo, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi held talks with CIA Director William Burns and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, with the aim of agreeing on a truce, protecting civilians and deliver more aid to the enclave, Egypt's state information service said. on Tuesday.
In a statement on its website, it cited an “interest in continuing consultations and coordination” on the key issues, indicating that no progress was made. Israeli representatives also attended the talks.
Meanwhile, in Gaza, Israeli forces are planning a ground assault on the 64-square-kilometer (25-square-mile) southern city of Rafah.
Rafah, whose pre-war population was about 300,000, now has about 1.4 million people, many of whom live in tent camps and makeshift shelters after Israel declared the city a “safe zone” while bombing areas in northern and central Gaza for four months.
No plan has been drawn up to evacuate civilians safely and aid agencies say those displaced have nowhere else to go in the shattered, besieged territory.
“Where are they going to evacuate people? Since nowhere is safe in the entire Gaza Strip, the north is destroyed, littered with unexploded weapons, it is practically uninhabitable,” Juliette Touma, spokesperson for the United Nations Agency United Nations for Palestinian Refugees, UNRWA. , saying.
Rafah under threat
Israeli tanks shelled parts of Rafah for the second night in a row, causing waves of panic, residents said.
Dozens of people were killed in overnight attacks on Monday. On Tuesday, two journalists, including an Arab correspondent for Al Jazeera, were attacked. A photojournalist working with him was also wounded in an Israeli airstrike in northern Rafah.
Amid threats of an Israeli ground attack, hundreds of displaced families have begun to leave Rafah.
“I fled al-Maghazi, I came to Rafah and here I am, returning to al-Maghazi,” said Nahla Jarwan, referring to the coastal refugee camp she fled at the beginning of the conflict.
Rafah neighbors Egypt, but Cairo has made clear it will not allow an exodus of refugees across the border.
Gaza health officials announced 133 new Palestinian deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 28,473 dead and 68,146 injured since October 7, when some 1,200 people were killed in a Hamas attack across the border with Israel, which triggered the offensive.
Inconclusive conversations
As truce talks were taking place in Egypt on Tuesday, a Hamas official told Al Jazeera that no delegation from the group was present. “We are still waiting for the results of the ongoing meetings in Cairo and communications continue with the mediators,” Hamas said.
A Palestinian official told the Reuters news agency that the parties are seeking “a formula that is acceptable to Hamas, which says it is only possible to sign an agreement once it is based on Israel's commitment to end its war and withdraw. their strength.” of the Gaza Strip.”
The official said Hamas had told participants that it does not trust Israel not to resume the war after Israeli captives in Gaza are freed.
The captives were captured during the Hamas raid into southern Israel on October 7. Securing their return is a priority, according to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, as is eliminating Hamas, which rules the enclave that has been under a crippling blockade for 17 years. .
“It is still too early to say exactly how close we are to an agreement, but we do know that the Israeli delegation includes the head of Israel's Mossad, the external security agency, and the Shin Bet, the internal security and intelligence agency. ”Al Jazeera correspondent Hamdah Salhut reported from occupied East Jerusalem.
Also on Tuesday, South Africa said it had asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to consider whether Israel's plan to extend its Rafah offensive required additional emergency measures to safeguard Palestinian rights.
In a case brought by South Africa, the ICJ last month ordered Israel to take all measures within its power to prevent its troops from committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The government in Pretoria expressed concern that an offensive on Rafah would lead to more large-scale killings, damage and destruction.
US President Joe Biden said on Monday that Washington was working on a hostage deal to bring “immediate and sustained” calm to Gaza for at least six weeks. Biden has urged Israel to refrain from an offensive in Rafah without a viable plan to protect civilians.
