For the first time, Hamas “tells” the attack on 7 October with which the new war began, which has reached day 107 today. It does so with a 16-page document, the group’s first public account of the “Al Aqsa Flood” operation ” in over three months. The attack against Israel is therefore described as “a necessary step“, although the “chaos” that followed provoked some “errors“. In the text, which gives information al Jazeera, we read that the attack was “a necessary step and the normal response to Israeli conspiracies against the Palestinian people.” “Perhaps – admits Hamas – some mistakes were made during the operation due to the rapid collapse of the security system and Israeli military and the case caused along the border areas with Gaza”. The Palestinian terrorist group then claims that the objective of the assault was to “immediately put an end to the Israeli aggression in Gaza, the crimes and ethnic cleansing committed against the entire Palestinian population”. In the document, Hamas renews its request to Israel to immediately stop the “aggression”. Netanyahu’s response, on the contrary, is the one that the Israeli prime minister now repeats daily to allies and enemies. For the prime minister, who yesterday was criticized by the UN secretary general for his rejection of the two-state hypothesis, “only total victory will guarantee the elimination of Hamas and the return of our hostages. As Prime Minister of Israel I support this position with determination even in the face of enormous international and domestic pressure. It was this obstinacy of mine that for years prevented a Palestinian state that would have constituted an existential danger for Israel. As long as I am prime minister, this will be my position.”
The tunnel – On the 107th day of conflict between Israel and Hamas, the troops of the Israeli Defense Forces, operating in the south of Gaza Stripthey announced that they had discovered a tunnel where terrorist hostages were held captive”in harsh and inhuman conditions” as stated by the IDF spokesman, the rear admiral Daniel Hagari. The entrance was found under the house of a Hamas commander in Khan Younis. “The tunnel was rigged with explosives and armored doors designed to protect terrorists and prevent the search for our hostages,” Hagari said. In the tunnel – at a depth of about 20 meters – a large room was found where about 20 hostages were held captive, some of whom were later freed. Drawings made by the little girl were also found Emilia Aloni, also released. To enter the structure – Hagari said – the soldiers fought and killed Hamas militiamen. An announcement that comes the day after demonstrations in central Tel Aviv against the Netanyahu government.
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Gaza, the Israeli army releases video of a tunnel discovered in Khan Younis: “20 hostages held captive here”
The hostage prisons – In an underground room in Khan Yunis, DNA traces of hostages captured on October 7 from Kibbutz Nir Oz were found, the daughter-in-law of one of the hostages, the eighty-year-old, later told Israeli commercial television Channel 12. Yoram Metzger. “It wasn’t blood, but traces of DNA left in the clothes,” he specified. His 78-year-old wife Tamar was captured with him and was released in November. Last month Hamas published a video in which Yoram Metzger appeared together with two other elderly hostages, in degraded physical conditions. According to the military spokesperson, around twenty Israeli prisoners were detained for a certain period in that cell – without light and with little air – whose fate remains unknown. “I don’t know where they are now – added Metzger’s daughter-in-law. – These are several elderly people in precarious physical conditions. It is clear that they risk not making it out alive.”
The threat from Hamas – “The choice is yours, whether you want to recover coffins or live people. Your government is lying, time is running out” is the statement, according to Al Jazeera, from the al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, who published a photo with a message addressed to the families of the hostages. The Qassam Brigades have previously claimed that many Israelis have been detained killed by Israeli airstrikes on the Strip since the beginning of the war.
The diplomatic front – Meanwhile – while the number of civilian victims has exceeded 25 thousand – they are ongoing diplomatic efforts from USA, Qatar and Egypt to push Israel and Hamas to agree on a new proposal and it is possible, according to the Wall Street Journal, that there will be a new round of negotiations in Cairo in the next few days. The mediators would have proposed a 90-day plan with the start of a ceasefire, release of all civilian hostages in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian detainees in Israel and a slow withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Strip. This first phase also includes an end to drone surveillance over Gaza and a significant increase in humanitarian aid. In the second phase, there would be the release by Hamas of the kidnapped female soldiers and the bodies of the dead at the same time as the release of other Palestinian detainees. In the third phase, the WSJ concludes, there would be the release of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers in exchange for the redeployment of the army outside the Strip.
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Voices from Gaza – “We don’t eat to leave food for the children, it’s a life of misery. And because of the blackout I have no idea where my family is.”
Sanchez’s appeal – Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez addressed the Israeli prime minister and asked for a “permanent ceasefire” in the face of the “inammissibili indiscriminate bombardmentii” in Gaza and the “death of boys and girls” in the Strip. Sanchez’s words were greeted by applause from the 1,700 participants at the PSOE convention underway in La Coruña. Among those present, in addition to the socialist cabinet ministers, was the EU high representative Joseph Borrell, to which Sanchez paid homage. “We feel extraordinarily proud that the EU High Representative is raising the flag of human rights in Gaza and the Middle East,” he underlined. Sánchez said that “obviously” socialists condemn “the terrible attacks” by Hamas against Israel, but “with the same determination” he asked Netanyahu to completely stop the bombings and to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, just as he energetically urged the convening of a peace conference and the recognition of the Palestinian state by the community international, receiving a standing ovation from all the participants, as reported by Efe.