Israel kills top Fatah official
After Israel killed a senior Fatah militant leader in an attack in Lebanon on Wednesday, the Palestinian movement has accused Israel of “provoking a regional war.”
- Israel kills top Fatah official as Gaza truce talks stumble
- Fatah accused of provoking a regional war
- Following Blinken’s failed truce efforts.
- Disagreements over Gaza’s future persist, while Israel’s bombardment of Gaza continues
Fatah, a Palestinian movement based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, said Khalil Maqda was killed in an attack near the southern Lebanese city of Sidon.
The army said it targeted the brother of Munir Maqda, who heads the Lebanese branch of Fatah militant group. It accused him of both “directing attacks and arms smuggling into the West Bank” and of working with Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
In response, the slain militant Fatah movement, led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and rival to the Islamist Hamas in the Gaza Strip, accused Israel of trying to provoke a wider regional war.
Maqda’s killing is the first such attack on a senior Fatah official in more than 10 months of cross-border clashes between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement following the Gaza war. “The assassination of Fatah officials is further evidence that Israel is trying to start an all-out war in the region,” Fatah Central Committee member Tawfik Tirawi told AFP in Ramallah.
This came just hours after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken departed empty-handed from a Middle East tour aimed at a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Blinken appealed to Hamas to quickly adopt a US-backed ceasefire plan, while also embarking on a public spat with Israel over the future of Israel’s presence in the besieged Palestinian territory.
“Time is of the essence,” Blinken said before flying out of Doha after stops in Qatar, Egypt and Israel on his ninth regional tour aimed at ending the Gaza war.
“This needs to be achieved, and it needs to be achieved within the next few days. We will make every effort to get across the finish line,” he said of the ceasefire plan. The US has put forward a proposal to bridge the gap and has been pressuring Hamas through Qatar and Egypt to return to the Cairo talks this week.
But a day after Blinken said the talks were also being held by US ally, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said they could not agree on key issues, Israeli media reported.
Netanyahu insisted that maintain control over the Philadelphia Corridor, the Gaza-Egypt border that forces seized from Hamas, and claimed Israel was smuggling weapons through secret tunnels.
Sticking point
Blinken said Israel has already agreed to a “time and place” for the withdrawal of its troops from Gaza.
Asked about Netanyahu’s comments, Blinken said it has been “very clear” since the start of the conflict that “the US will not accept Israel’s long-term occupation of Gaza.” A senior US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Netanyahu’s “maximalist rhetoric” would not help secure a ceasefire.
Blinken acknowledged differences and called for “maximum flexibility” from both Israel and Hamas.
Egypt, the first Arab state to make peace with Israel, is angry about the border occupation.
Hamas said it was “eager for a ceasefire” but opposed “new conditions” from in the latest US proposal.
On the ground, Gaza Strip was hit by renewed airstrikes, AFP journalists, first responders and witnesses said. The army said it struck about 30 targets across Gaza and that troops had eliminated “dozens” of militants.
The UN’s Palestinian refugee agency said death seemed “the only certainty” for Gaza’s 2.4 million people, with no way to escape artillery fire.
“No place is absolutely safe,” UNRWA spokeswoman Louise Waterridge said. “People … feel like they’re being chased in circles.” “Death seems to be the only certainty,” she told AFPTV.
Amid rising tensions, Lebanon’s health ministry said airstrikes in the country’s east had killed one person and wounded 20 so far, hours after four were killed in the south.
There are almost daily cross-border skirmishes, but the killing of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh on July 31 while visiting Tehran raised fears of a major crisis.
Iran has vowed to retaliate, blaming Israel for the attack, but has so far held back while the United States sends in additional troops and warns that a larger war could destroy prospects for a Gaza ceasefire.
Elsewhere in the region, a merchant ship was hit by three bullets after two ships exchanged fire off the coast of Yemen, according to British maritime security agency UKMTO. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which came as Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi movement continues its campaign against international shipping it says serves the Gaza Strip.
About The Author
