To better understand the latest events in the conflict between the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas and Israel, 20 minutes takes stock every evening. Between the strong declarations, the diplomatic advances or the dramatic results of the fighting, here are the main points of the day.
News of the day
An agreement on the release of hostages held in the Gaza Strip by Hamas is “very close”, declared US President Joe Biden from the White House. The negotiations have “never been so close to an agreement,” assured a representative of Qatar, mediator in this matter.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who met relatives of the hostages on Monday evening, reported “progress” in the negotiations and said he hoped for “good news soon”. Benjamin Netanyahu made their release a prerequisite for any ceasefire, while the Israeli army continues its offensive against Hamas on the 46th day of the war. As a reminder, around 240 people were kidnapped during the bloody attack launched by the Islamist movement in power in the Gaza Strip against Israel on October 7. Doha is working with Washington and Cairo to obtain the release of hostages held in Gaza in exchange for that of Palestinian prisoners and a truce in the fighting.
The number of the day
53. This is the number of journalists and media workers who have been killed since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas on October 7, according to the latest count from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), published Tuesday. Forty-six were Palestinian, four were Israeli and three were Lebanese, according to the press defense organization, headquartered in New York and which counts victims in Israel, the Gaza Strip and the Lebanese border.
Sentence of the day
The deliberate refusal to provide medicine, fuel, food and water to the people of Gaza amounts to genocide (…) the collective punishment of Palestinian civilians through the unlawful use of force and the deliberate refusal to provide medicine, fuel, food and water to the inhabitants of Gaza as a war crime. »
These are the words of South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who, this Tuesday during the summit of emerging Brics countries, accused Israel of “war crimes” and “genocide” in Gaza. Ramaphosa had requested on Friday with four other states an investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into this war.
Today’s trend
Risk of cholera, hospitals overflowing with wounded, shortages of water and fuel… A real health “tragedy” is looming in the Gaza Strip, due to the lack of fuel and water, warned the United Nations Fund for childhood (UNICEF) Tuesday. “If there is not enough fuel, we will see the collapse of sanitation services,” said UNICEF spokesperson James Elder during a videoconference press briefing. from Cairo, describing the situation as a true “tragedy” or a “perfect storm” caused by the outbreak of diseases. “We are seriously lacking water. Fecal matter litters densely populated areas. There is an unacceptable lack of latrines,” he added.
The spokesperson also stressed that it is very difficult to practice personal hygiene or even just wash your hands in Gaza. “If children’s access to water and sanitation in Gaza remains limited and insufficient, we will see a tragic increase (…) in the number of child deaths,” Elder noted. Children therefore face a serious risk of mass epidemics. »
A WHO spokesperson, Christian Lindmeier, for his part indicated that for the moment there was no trace of cholera in the Gaza Strip, where the bacteria which causes the disease was not present. before the outbreak of war. On the other hand, he stressed that the watery diarrhea from which thousands of very physically weakened people suffer is just as dangerous.