The Albany Gazette - Gaza truce talks resume in Qatar as violence shows no let-up

The civil defence agency said a dawn air strike on the home of the al-Ghoula family in Gaza City killed 11 people, seven of them children.

AFP images from the Gaza City area neighbourhood of Shujaiya showed residents combing through smoking rubble. Bodies including those of small children were lined up on the ground, shrouded in white sheets.

As the violence raged, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz confirmed that indirect negotiations with Hamas had resumed in Qatar for the release of hostages seized in the October 2023 attacks.

The minister told relatives of one of the hostages, woman soldier Liri Albag, that "efforts are under way to free the hostages, notably the Israeli delegation which left yesterday (Friday) for negotiations in Qatar", his office said.

Katz said that Prime Minister Benajamin has given "detailed instructions for the continued negotiations".

He was speaking after Hamas's armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, released a video of Albag in captivity in Gaza.

In the undated, three-and-half-minute recording that AFP has not been able to verify, the 19-year-old conscript called in Hebrew for the Israeli government to secure her release.

In response, her family issued an appeal to Netanyahu, saying: "It's time to take decisions as if it were your own children there."

A total of 96 Israeli hostages remain in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

Campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said the latest video was "firm and incontestable proof of the urgency of bringing the hostages home".

Hamas had said late on Friday that the negotiations were poised to resume.

The militant group, whose October 7, 2023 attack on Israel triggered the Gaza war, said they would "focus on ensuring the agreement leads to a complete cessation of hostilities (and) the withdrawal of occupation forces".

Mediators Qatar, Egypt and the United States have been engaged in months of effort that have failed to end nearly 15 months of war.

In December, Qatar expressed optimism that "momentum" was returning to the talks following the US election of Donald Trump, who takes office in 16 days.

But Hamas and Israel then accused each other of setting new conditions and obstacles.

As the clock ticks down to the handover of power in Washington, the outgoing administration of President Joe Biden notified Congress of an $8 billion arms sale to Israel, a source familiar with the plan said on Saturday.

"The department has informally notified Congress of an $8 billion proposed sale of munitions to support Israel's long-term security by resupplying stocks of critical munitions and air defence capabilities," the official said.

The United States is Israel's largest military supplier.

- 'Everything was shaking' -

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said the Ghoula home in Gaza City "was completely destroyed" by the dawn strike.

"It was a two-storey building and several people are still under the rubble," he said, adding Israeli drones had "also fired on ambulance staff".

Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army did not immediately comment on the strike.

"A huge explosion woke us up. Everything was shaking," said neighbour Ahmed Mussa.

"It was home to children, women. There wasn't anyone wanted or who posed a threat."

Elsewhere, the civil defence agency said an Israeli strike killed five security officers tasked with accompanying aid convoys as they drove through the southern city of Khan Yunis.

The Israeli army said the five had been "implicated in terrorist activities" and were not escorting aid trucks at the time of the strike.

Rescuers said strikes elsewhere in Gaza killed 10 other people.

AFP images showed Palestine Red Crescent paramedics in Gaza City moving the body of one of their colleagues, his green jacket laid over the blanket that covered his corpse.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said a total of 136 people had been killed over the previous 48 hours.

The Hamas attack that triggered the Gaza war resulted in the deaths of 1,208 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.

Israel's retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 45,717 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Gaza health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.

(A.Johnson--TAG)