Israel and Palestinian resistance group Hamas agreed to extend the temporary truce for one more day moments before it was set to expire on Wednesday night. The decision to extend the truce was announced by Qatar which is mediating the negotiations.
According to the terms of the deal Hamas will release 10 more hostages on Thursday, November 30 which will include two women with Russia-Israel dual citizenship. In return Israel will release 30 more Palestinians.
On the sixth day of the truce on Wednesday, Israel released 30 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Hamas releasing 12 Israelis and 4 foreign captives. Among the Palestinians released from Israeli jails were Ahed Tamimi who was arrested during the early days of the war in Gaza from her home in the occupied West Bank.
The talks to extend the truce for a longer period were still going on under Qatari, Egyptian and US mediation. According to a statement issued by the Egyptian state information services on Thursday, mediators are pushing for another extension for two more days and more aid trucks in Gaza.
Anthony Blinken, the US secretary of state, is visiting Israel on Thursday. This is his fourth visit to the region since October 7. During his meeting with Israeli president Isaac Herzog in Tel Aviv, Blinken expressed the hope that the truce will be extended.
Meanwhile, Israeli occupation forces were conducting raids at different places in the occupied West Bank including Tulkarm where they have surrounded the refugee camp and conducting house to house searches and drone surveys. At least 45 Palestinians were arrested in the last 24 hours during these raids.
At least two Palestinians were killed in a shooting in the occupied Jerusalem on Thursday morning after Israeli civilians opened fire at them following a shooting in which three Israelis were reportedly killed and scores of others were wounded.
Details of death and destruction in Gaza emerge
The halt in the war has provided the space for the assessment of the scale of destruction caused by the Israeli bombardments and ground offensive since October 7.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), between October 7 and November 28, at least 427 attacks were carried out by Israel on the healthcare system in the occupied Palestinian territories killing 588 people and injuring 758 others. At least 56 different health facilities in Gaza alone were targeted by Israel making most of them dysfunctional. 17 others were attacked in the occupied West Bank.
In one such attack, Israeli forces closed the intensive care unit in Al-Naseer children hospital forcefully. After the truce, health staff were finally able to enter the unit where they found five “partially decomposed bodies of five premature babies” who were left behind by the Israeli forces. The Palestinian Authority confirmed the crime in a post.
During its aggression against Gaza Strip, the #Israeli occupation raids targeted several #hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip, and a number of them were evacuated under the intense bombardment and a tight siege. Since the first day of the humanitarian truce that began last… pic.twitter.com/AXUVSATRWl
— State of Palestine – MFA 🇵🇸🇵🇸 (@pmofa) November 30, 2023
Israel dropped ammunition equivalent to two nuclear bombs between October 7 and November 24 when the temporary truce came into existence for the first time. The bombings destroyed over 60,000 residential structures and damaged nearly 300,000 structures, forcing over 1.5 million Gazans to leave their homes to live in temporary shelters or under the open sky.
According to the Palestinian Journalist Syndicate (PJS), Israel committed close to 350 different crimes and serious violations against Palestinian journalists between October 7 and November 24. They killed at least 70 Palestinian journalists. Two Palestinian journalists are still missing and 28 others are being detained by Israel.
It was reported on Thursday that there is a growing scarcity of food in the Gaza strip. Though the truce allowed 200 trucks of aid per day inside the Palestinian territories, relief agencies stated that they received only 1,132 trucks until Wednesday, meaning less than 190 trucks a day. Even 200 per day falls far below the pre-October 7 number. Due to the blockade imposed on the 2.3 million people in Gaza for over 16 years, Israeli occupation authorities allowed 500 aid trucks to enter Gaza and this was already considered inadequate.
The complete blockade imposed on Gaza during the war has exacerbated the suffering of Palestinian people in the enclave.
