Havana/For fear that Hamas will be able to rebuild its attack infrastructure in Gaza, and obtain a strategic advantage, Israel “cannot accept” the end of the war as a condition for achieving a ceasefire in the area that would allow the release of the Israeli hostages who remain captive in the Palestinian enclave, assured Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“We are not willing to accept a situation in which Hamas battalions leave their safe havens, retake control of Gaza, rebuild their military infrastructure and once again threaten the citizens of Israel in adjacent communities,” the president said. in a message released this Sunday.
Netanyahu’s words come in the midst of a series of negotiations in Egypt, centered on Cairo, to reach a truce agreement between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, as has been reported.
The prime minister also referred to information that suggests that the terrorist group has made a definitive end to hostilities as an unavoidable condition of a possible agreement to release the kidnapped Israelis.
“Hamas has remained entrenched in its extreme positions, in particular the demand to withdraw all our forces from the Strip, end the war and leave Hamas intact,” he said.
Netanyahu also sent a message to the Israeli hostages who remain imprisoned by Hamas in the Gaza area and their families, who have been demonstrating for several weeks to demand a truce that allows their early release.
“Hamas is the one who is preventing the release of the kidnapped people. “We are doing everything possible to free those kidnapped,” the Prime Minister of Israel said in this regard.
At the same time, the head of the Hamas political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, reiterated that the Islamist group remains interested in reaching a truce agreement in Gaza, but said that this has no reason to exist if it does not lead to a definitive end to the war. .
“The priority of the movement is to stop the aggression against our people, which is a fundamental and logical position, and establishes a more stable future,” Haniyeh said in an official statement published on the Hamas website this Sunday.
Yesterday, the EFE agency maintained that Palestinian sources revealed that the leader of the Islamist group in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, “wants a written American commitment for the unconditional end of the fighting” and confirmed the version that Hamas asks Israel not to prevent return the liberated Palestinians to the West Bank in exchange for the Israeli hostages.
Meanwhile, the Israeli authorities closed this Sunday the Kerem Shalom border crossing that leads to the south of the Gaza Strip, after a rocket attack was carried out which, hours later, was claimed by the Al Qasam brigades, considered the armed wing of Hamas in the area.
“Approximately ten projectile launches were identified crossing from the area adjacent to the Rafah crossing towards the Kerem Shalom area,” the Israeli military said in a brief statement.
After the attack on the border crossing, which until today was used to send humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, there are reports of seven people injured, three of whom remain serious, according to what was published by Israeli media that did not They have specified whether the injured are military or civilians.
