Hamas releases second video of Israeli hostage and says it will not disarm until Palestinian state established
Responding to one of the key Israeli demands to end the war in Gaza, Hamas – which has dominated the territory since 2007 – said it could not yield its right to 'armed resistance' unless an 'independent, fully sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital' is established.
Indirect negotiations between Hamas and Israel aimed at securing a 60-day ceasefire in the Gaza war and deal for the release of hostages ended last week in deadlock.
On Saturday, Hamas released a second video of hostage Evyatar David. In it, David is skeletally thin and is shown digging a hole, which, he says in the video, is for his own grave.
Israeli restrictions on the entry of goods and aid into Gaza have led to severe shortages of food and other essentials, stoking international demands for a ceasefire. UN-backed food security experts said this week that the 'worst-case scenario of famine' is now playing out in Gaza.
Hamas has included this issue in their hostage videos, warning that the hostages are going hungry alongside their captors and that time is running out for a ceasefire.
In a statement, the family of David demanded that the aid that is now getting into Gaza thanks to renewed UN convoys and foreign airdrops must also reach their son.
'They are on the absolute brink of death,' his brother Ilay said at a rally in support of the hostages in Tel Aviv, where thousands gathered holding posters of those in captivity and chanted for their immediate release.
Of the 251 hostages taken during the Hamas attack, 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.
Donald Trump's Middle East envoy on Saturday told families of hostages that he was working with the Israeli government on a plan that would effectively end the war in Gaza.
Steve Witkoff, who arrived in Israel as Benjamin Netanyahu's government faced global outcry over the devastation in Gaza and the starvation growing among its 2.2 million people, met the prime minister on Thursday. On Friday he visited an aid distribution site run by the Israel and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Global outrage has grown over Israel's restrictions on aid and the deadly unrest surrounding the GHF sites, with daily reports of shootings at all four locations since the group took over aid distribution at the end of May. The UN says 859 Palestinians have been killed during that time in the vicinity of these sites, and more than 500 have been killed along the routes of food convoys.
Hospitals in Gaza say Israeli fire killed more than a dozen people on Saturday, eight of them while trying to get food.
Israel blames Hamas for the suffering in Gaza and says it is taking steps for more aid to reach its population, including pausing fighting for part of the day in some areas, airdrops and announcing protected routes for aid convoys. UN agencies have said that airdrops of food are insufficient and that Israel must let in far more aid by land and quickly ease the access to it.
Seven Palestinians died of malnutrition-related causes over the past 24 hours, including a child, the territory's health ministry said on Saturday. This brings the total deaths among children from causes related to malnutrition in Gaza to 93 since the war began.
The German government, traditionally a staunch ally of Israel, joined calls for Israel to deliver more aid on Saturday, saying that the current amount remains 'very insufficient'.
France's foreign minister also called for humanitarian aid to be supplied to the people of Gaza in massive quantities, while also denouncing as 'despicable' videos of Israeli hostages held in Gaza posted by Hamas's armed wing.
With Reuters and Agence France-Presse
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Advertisement "The amount of money involved in the Bill is miniscule, as former minister Shatter pointed out, but what it means to the people out there is so important. Hopefully this will lead to bigger things like a permanent ceasefire, and if our small gesture is any way part of that, to me that is a success. "On the ground this means so much to them. They are watching this, and it is getting worldwide publicity. Within 24 hours of the last committee there were comments from the American ambassador in Israel, America itself, it is being heard worldwide our stance and that we are taking the lead on this. "It is being heard on the ground but we must maintain this, and credit has to go to our leaders for putting their heads above the parapet to call this as it is. "Simon Harris stood up in the Dáil and was one of the first leaders to call this genocide and he deserves credit for that, it was not easy. Advertisement "If I had found in Cairo this was absolutely irrelevant, I would have taken that on board and would have said that at committee, but it was the complete opposite. "This small thing, in the wider scale, is a big part of the momentum." He said: "To be fair to Simon Harris and Micheál Martin we were one of the first to stand up and take the lead on this, but we must continue to do that. This Bill may be a small token, but out there is means so much to people. "This is beyond politics now, the committee has shown and proven that we're in agreement on this, there is political will to pass this Bill right across the foreign affairs committee." Advertisement Mr Brennan said the Bill, now known as the Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill, is still awaiting a final legal opinion from the Attorney General. He also welcomed the inclusion of a ban in trade in services that has been included in the recommendation from the Foreign Affairs Committee. I spoke to a man dying in bed, his biggest concern was for his brother who is still in Gaza. Mr Brennan said he was amazed at how much the people he met in Cairo were aware of Ireland's solidarity and the Occupied Territories Bill, along with the early recognition of a Palestinian State, along with South Africa. "To go out there and to see the fear in people's eyes. I spoke to a man dying in bed, his biggest concern was for his brother who is still in Gaza. "He had months to live because of injuries that were beyond recovery. We have to acknowledge the genocide, the atrocities going on out there, the starvation. Most of the world is in agreement this is going on and not being exaggerated. "The mothers and fathers, medics and journalists, everyone out there is suffering... we need a ceasefire. "There are pockets of food being allowed in at the moment, it's not enough. Open the borders, let the food and aid in. "My takeaways from that trip were number one, they knew so much about the Bill and what's happening in Ireland, number two I left with a great fear for the future. The teenagers and young people I spoke to out there were annoyed and upset that the world was standing by watching what was going on, with the exception of Ireland and South Africa. "Looking as their brothers, sisters, parents, grandparents are being wiped out, where will they be in five years' time? They'll be angry young men and women unless they are given the help they need. "We need a long-term solution. That includes Hamas releasing the hostages too." Mr Brennan, who topped the poll in Wexford-Wicklow in the general election, is a first-time TD. 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