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Israel’s army says 31 of the hostages in Gaza are lifeless – a fifth of the 136 folks nonetheless being held captive by Hamas.
It comes after a doc compiled by Israeli intelligence officers reported by the New York Occasions, urged 32 have died for the reason that Hamas assault inside Israel on 7 October and the Israeli bomardment of Gaza in response.
4 army sources, who spoke on situation of anonymity, mentioned Israel was additionally assessing unconfirmed intelligence indicating that no less than 20 different hostages might have additionally been killed, the paper reported.
The circumstances of the hostage deaths stays unclear with the Israeli authorities suggesting that lots of these deaths had occurred throughout Hamas’s lethal assault, during which 1,200 folks had been killed and no less than one other 240 taken hostage.
The Israeli army advised the New York Occasions that it was “deploying all obtainable sources to find and retrieve as a lot data as potential relating to the hostages at the moment held by Hamas.”
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, met officers in Egypt and Qatar on Tuesday throughout his fifth journey to the Center East since October, because the three international locations search a hostage launch deal and the battle’s first prolonged truce. Greater than 100 captives, largely ladies and kids, had been launched throughout a weeklong ceasefire in November in change for the discharge of 240 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
The US’s high diplomat started the day in Saudi Arabia earlier than jetting first to Cairo after which Doha to satisfy the rulers of Egypt and Qatar, mediators in talks that conveyed a truce provide to Hamas final week.
Smoke rises from buildings following strikes in Gaza
(AP)
Israel, which is urgent on with its offensive deep into components of the Gaza Strip now sheltering a whole bunch of hundreds of individuals displaced from earlier preventing, mentioned its forces had killed dozens of Palestinian gunmen up to now 24 hours.
Palestinians hope Mr Blinken’s talks will nail down a ceasefire earlier than Israeli forces storm Rafah, the place greater than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million individuals are sheltering, primarily in public buildings and tents constituted of sheets of plastic, arduous towards the border with Egypt.
Mr Blinken met Egyptian president Abdel Fatah al-Sisi in Cairo and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha. Mr Blinken is ready to satisfy Israeli leaders and the Western-backed Palestinian Authority on Wednesday.
The deal, drawn up greater than per week in the past by US and Israeli spy chiefs at a gathering with the Egyptians and Qataris, would safe the discharge of remaining hostages held by militants in Gaza in return for a protracted pause to preventing. Hamas says it should produce a definitive finish to the battle. Israel says it is not going to halt the battle completely till Hamas is destroyed.
Extra reporting by companies