An injured child reacts following Israeli bombardment on al-Bureij, as she sits on the floor at a ward at the Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on June 4, 2024 .AFP
It said that the Israeli leadership's concerns about the possibility that Washington would not support the continuation of the war — within the framework of the proposed deal with the Palestinian resistance group — prompted it to request these guarantees.
The War Council's decision to request these guarantees may rule out the possibility of reaching a deal, the authority quoted a source in Benjamin Netanyahu's government as saying.
Ongoing bombardment
On Wednesday, Israel's army pounded central Gaza with heavy airstrikes, as US, Qatari, and Egyptian mediators planned to resume talks on a truce and a captive release deal.
Urban combat and Israeli shelling rocked Gaza's southern city of Rafah, the last area hit by the Israeli ground invasion launched in northern Gaza in late October.
Fighting has also flared again in central areas, where the Israeli occupation army said that the troops have targeted the areas of Bureij and eastern Deir Al-Balah.
Bombardment of central Gaza has killed 11 people near the Al-Maghazi camp and two others near Deir Al-Balah, said witnesses and Palestinian civil defense and hospital officials.
Families rushed the wounded, including children, to hospitals in the area, where AFP reporters said civilians were once more packing their belongings on pickup trucks and onto wheelchairs to flee.
Full-court press
last Friday, US President Joe Biden outlined what he called a three-phase Israeli plan that would halt the fighting for six weeks while captives are exchanged for Palestinian prisoners and aid is stepped up.
Biden has urged Hamas to accept the deal and deployed CIA chief Bill Burns to Qatar for a renewed push after months of back-and-forth negotiations.
A source with knowledge of the talks said Burns would "continue working with mediators on reaching an agreement."
Brett McGurk, Biden's top Middle East adviser, was also headed to Qatar, according to news site Axios which quoted an administration source as talking of a "full-court press ... to get a breakthrough."
"An Egyptian security delegation will meet with its Qatari and US counterparts in Doha on Wednesday to discuss mechanisms of restoring truce talks," Egypt's Al-Qahera News said.
Qatar said Tuesday that it had yet to see statements from either side "that give us a lot of confidence," but also that Doha was "working with both sides on proposals on the table."
On Tuesday, a senior Hamas official in Beirut accused Israel of seeking "endless" negotiations and repeated the group's position of rejecting any deal that excludes a permanent ceasefire.
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