On Friday, an Israeli drone strike killed two people in Gaza, said local Palestinian medical authorities, stressing the uncertainty surrounding a fragile ceasefire agreement that interrupted the fights in the enclave for weeks.
The Israeli army said that the drone had struck a group of alleged activists operating near its troops in the north of Gaza and planting an explosive apparatus in the ground, but it has given no details on the victims.
The soldiers, under the new Lieutenant-General of the Army. Eyal Zamir, made preparations for a return to war in Gaza if no agreement can be concluded with Hamas to extend the 42-day ceasefire accepted last month.
But with a visit in the coming days of the special envoy of the president of the American president Donald Trump, Steve Witkoff, who had direct talks with Hamas, there was no indication that Israel abandoned the pursuit of the ceasefire.
A delegation from Hamas arrived in Cairo for interviews with Egyptian mediators who helped facilitate talks with Qatar officials, aimed at going to the next stage of the agreement, which could open the way at the end of the war.
In an apparent effort to put pressure on Israel, Hamas published a video showing the Israeli soldier Matan Arestrest, one of the 59 Israeli and foreign hostages still detained in the Gaza Strip.
Shortly if the ceasefire talks will go forward
Despite a number of hiccups, the ceasefire has been widely organized since January 19, granting the exchange of 33 Israeli hostages and five Thai for around 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and prisoners.
But it is not clear if the talks to release the remaining hostages and finish the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza will go ahead, despite Trump’s pressure, which demanded that Hamas put all those who are always held or face devastating consequences.
Israel demanded the return of his hostages and an extension of the truce through the Sacred Muslim Ramadan month until after the Jewish holidays in Passover in April. But he refused to agree to open talks that would cover problems such as the final withdrawal of his Gaza troops and post-war administration for the enclave.
Israel says that he will continue to block all humanitarian assistance in Gaza unless Hamas accepts to extend the first phase of the ceasefire agreement, which expired on Saturday. Hamas wants to go directly to phase 2 of the initial agreement, which includes all the Israeli forces withdraw from Gaza.
Zamir, the new military leader of Israel, visited troops since he assumed the command of the Israeli defense forces this week and said that the army was ready to return to combat to Gaza if it is orderly.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health and officials of the Al-Ahly Hospital said that two people had been killed during Friday drone strike in the Shejaia region in Gaza City. A similar incident killed three people on Thursday. The army said that the strike also targeted individuals with a bomb near the Israeli troops.
The first Friday of Ramadan saw thousands of people entering the fortified old town of Jerusalem to pray at the Al-Aqsa mosque, Israel allowing a limited number of Palestinians and older children of the busy West Bank to cross the city.
“We have not come for three or four years, but thank God for the happiness and joy that we have been able to reach the Al-Aqsa mosque. It was the greatest joy for Muslims,” said Salah Aleiwi, who came from the West Bank.
Tensions are increasing in the West Bank
The mosque, on a site in the old town of Jerusalem, that the Jews call the Mount of the Temple and rever like the site of two ancient temples, is a holy place for the two religions and has long been an objective for the clashes which have sometimes made a work in a broader conflict.
The tensions in the West Bank have increased in the middle of an Israeli operation of several weeks against the Palestinian refugee camps, where troops have demolished dozens of houses and destroy the roads and other infrastructures, sending tens of thousands of camp residents of their homes.
Israel says that the operation is directed against the Palestinian militant groups supported by Iran enriched in the camps.
On Friday, there was a heavy deployment of the police in the narrow paved streets of the old town but no report of serious problems.
“Israeli police are distributed through Jerusalem and Israel to authorize the safe environment for the arrival of all these faithful coming here,” said police spokesperson Dean Elsdunne.
In recent years, the Israeli authorities have regularly restricted access to the compound of the mosque, citing security needs, and the entry on Friday was conditional for the approval of the police, even for those who qualified by age.
Ibtisam Abdul Fattah, a 65 -year -old woman from the West Bank, said she had been returned twice at the checkpoint of the West Bank of Qalandiya, just north of Jerusalem. “We are in our country but we are not allowed,” she said.
