Netanyahu dismisses ceasefire proposal, sets sights on Rafah

JERUSALEM

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday dismissed Hamas's demand for a ceasefire and ordered troops to prepare to move on the city of Rafah in Gaza's far south, where more than one million Palestinians have sought refuge.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, speaking in Tel Aviv hours after meeting Netanyahu, said he still saw "space for agreement to be reached" and that he had warned the Israeli leader against actions and talk that "inflame tensions".

Netanyahu had told a televised briefing that he had ordered troops to "prepare to operate" in Rafah and that a "total victory" by Israel over Hamas was just months away.

But he warned that accepting the Palestinian militant group's "bizarre demands" for a ceasefire would not lead to the return of hostages, charging that "it will only invite another massacre".

In Beirut, a senior Hamas official responded, saying Netanyahu's "insistence on continuing the aggression totally confirms that the goal... is genocide against the Palestinian people".

The official, Osama Hamdan, urged "all resistance factions... to continue the fight" and to be cautious of Israeli "treachery during the final quarter-hour of this confrontation".

One of the hostages released as part of a temporary ceasefire deal brokered in November also put pressure on the Israeli leader.

"Everything is in your hands," Adina Moshe told a news conference in Tel Aviv, addressing Netanyahu.

"You're the one. And I'm very afraid and very concerned that if you continue with this line of destroying Hamas, there won't be any hostages left to release," she said.

 ' A lot of work to be done' 

Earlier, U.S. envoy Blinken, on his fifth Middle East tour since the war broke out, had expressed hope for a ceasefire and hostage release deal, even as he cautioned that there was "a lot of work to be done."

"But we are very much focused on doing that work and hopefully being able to resume the release of hostages that was interrupted" after a week-long truce in November, Blinken said after meeting Netanyahu in Jerusalem.

An official from mediator Egypt told AFP that "a new round of negotiations" would start on Thursday in Cairo aimed at achieving "calm in the Gaza Strip".

A Hamas source with knowledge of the matter said the Palestinian militant group had agreed to the Cairo talks, with the goal of "a ceasefire, an end to the war and a prisoner exchange deal".

Last week, a Hamas source said the proposed new truce calls for a six-week pause to fighting and a hostage-prisoner exchange, as well as more aid for Gaza, but negotiations have continued since.

Blinken also made a new plea for more aid into Gaza, whose 2.4 million people have endured a crippling siege and severe shortages of clean water, food, fuel and medical supplies.

"We all have an obligation to do everything possible to get the necessary assistance to those who so desperately need it," Blinken said, "and the steps that are being taken — additional steps that need to be taken — are the focus of my own meetings here."

Blinken also travelled to the occupied West Bank where he met Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

 'Horror movie' 

For now, the war which entered its fifth month on Wednesday raged on unabated in Hamas-ruled Gaza, where the health ministry said at least 123 people were killed in the past 24 hours.

The health ministry said that two Palestinians had been killed when Israeli troops surrounded the house of a wanted man in Nur Shams camp near Tulkarem in northern occupied West Bank.

U.N. chief Antonio Guterres said he was "alarmed" by reports Israeli forces would push on into Rafah, which is crammed with more than half of Gaza's population.

"Such an action would exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare with untold regional consequences," Guterres said.

Israel vowed to eliminate Hamas and launched air strikes and a ground offensive that have killed at least 27,708 people, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Dana Ahmed, 40, who was displaced from Gaza City with her three children and now lives in a tent in Rafah, said she spent a sleepless night as Israeli fighter jets roared through the sky and explosions shook the ground.

"I cannot imagine what will happen to us," she said. "Where will we go now? The situation is catastrophic. I feel like I am living a horror movie."

 Israel destroys tunnel 

Israeli troops have pushed steadily south through the coastal territory, with the heaviest combat raging in the city of Khan Yunis in recent weeks.

The military said it had found and destroyed a tunnel in the city that had been used by senior Hamas leaders and to hold hostages.

Amid the Gaza war, Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen have launched attacks in support of Hamas, and Israel, the United States and its allies have launched strikes on them.

Yemen's Huthi rebels have targeted what they say are Israel-linked ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, disrupting global trade and prompting reprisals by U.S. and British forces.

Last week, the United States also carried out strikes on Iran-backed groups in Syria and Iraq, killing dozens in retaliation for an attack that killed three U.S. troops in Jordan.

Israel has also traded deadly cross-border fire with Lebanon's Hezbollah movement and has repeatedly bombed Iran-linked targets in Syria. Lebanese state media said the latest Israeli strikes on Wednesday killed one civilian.