As the number of people killed in Gaza surpasses 300, international efforts to establish a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas are intensifying.
Qatar, home base to senior Hamas officials, appears to have been involved in diplomatic talks for days, a development that Egypt’s foreign ministry has criticized and that Israel itself is unhappy about.
QNA reports that Qatar’s foreign minister spoke to senior officials in the US, France and Norway yesterday to discuss “the means to reach an agreement for a cease-fire between the Palestinian and Israeli sides.”
The talks continue despite criticism from Egypt’s foreign minister earlier this week, who blamed Qatar, Turkey and Hamas of undermining Cairo’s attempts to reach a ceasefire between the aggrieved parties.
Strained relations
Egypt had proposed a ceasefire on Tuesday, which Israel accepted but Hamas rejected, saying they were not invited to the negotiation table. The group has shaky ties with Cairo, which sees it as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, according to Reuters.
Qatar’s own relationship with Brotherhood supporters have also put it off sides with Egypt in the last year.
Meanwhile, Israel’s foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman also blamed Turkey and Qatar for the sunk ceasefire agreement. Speaking to Norway’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Lieberman said, as quoted by Haaretz:
“Hamas was ready to consider the Egyptian proposal favorably but Qatar wanted to screw the Egyptians and told them not to accept it.”
The newspaper added that Khaled Meshal, head of Hamas’ political bureau, prefers working with Turkey and Qatar, where he is based. However, Israel prefers Egypt as a negotiator, due to its shaky ties with Turkey and lack of a relationship with Qatar.
For his part, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was reported as telling journalists yesterday:
“Israel threatens world peace. Israel threatens peace in the Middle East. Therefore, I personally, can never contemplate anything positive with Israel as long as I remain on duty. Israel is at the moment waging terrorism; Israel at the moment is carrying out genocide,” he said.
Turkey has also hit out at the United Nations and called on it to do more to step up efforts to establish a ceasefire.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to head to the Middle East today to help end the conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas.
Thoughts?
Senior Hamas officials sitting in comfort on Qatar sipping champagne while their people are dying in Gaza. Send them back to Gaza and that may incentivise them to reach an agreement quicker.
Saying that Israel is the school yard bully and is committing crimes against humanity with its totally disproportion use of force. Still waiting for America to isolate them and then they will have to change. Some chance of that happening.
Have you seen on of them sipping champagne ?
Send them to Gaza? How? Gaza is locked by land, sea and air?
You do know they will be arrested the moment they stop foot back in Gaza or the West Bank?
If the Arafat family owns prominent gambling stations(and i wonder where the money came from hmmmmm?) why should we doubt that they’re sipping champagne?
The whole idea is that the officials are “laxed” in a country far away from its citizens while their people that they are supposed to protect are dying. And refusing a ceasefire like egotistical children is not right especially with the number of casualties.
We love love love to blame the enemy, and we hardly look close to home.
Very true. I remember the kids of PLO leaders driving Mercedes to university in London and enjoying getting drunk, while pleading the poverty of the Palestinians
Arafat was a very rich man when he died
Exactly… PLO and PA are not Hamas… They are very different and separate political entities …
Hamas is one thing, and arafaat who are part of fath party is another!
That’s true, Hamas are worst and value an life less
Why they “are worst”? They were democratically elected by the people of Palestine and the least we can do is to respect their opinion. After all, they are not as corrupt as their counterparts in PLO
arrested?!~ how about assassinated like Ahmed Yassine, and all the other guys!
One of the most uninformed comments I have seen on here to date. The reason they are not in Gaza is not because they want to sit in comfort here and sip champagne but for fear of persecution/execution. Its best you research the origins of the conflict before spurting out those comments. I guess we should say the same of the millions of Palestinian refugees across the world??
It is in Hamas interest to keep the conflict going. No war with Israel no reason for Hamas. They don’t care about Palestinians dying, that is the price they are willing to pay to keep power.
Don’t get me wrong I blame Israel for this problem. They are as much terrorists as Hamas but with better weapons.
While the PA watches on
it does not seem that people of Gaza strip were living before anyways, no water, electricity, food and locked from all sides by you-know-who! It is a big prison!
it was bumped and showered by rockets before many times with no reason! (Just like many parts of Palestine)!!
Why wouldn’t they resist now?! Resisting the unjust isn’t terrorism!
btw, what do u mean by “that is the price they are willing to pay to keep power” Last time i remember Hamas won the elections fairly! unlike some others who are still in power in the west bank!!
What reason would Hamas have to accept such a meditation from Egypt that results in depriving the resistant movement from all weapons for stopping the fire only?!!
the Turkish-Qatari side offers building a commercial port for gaza strip, ease the siege and much more!
U think the people of Gaze who were born in these circumstances would accept stopping fire for being deprived from their weapons?! while nothing guarantees that Isreal wont do it again in a couple of years?!
Hamas was created by Israel. They both need each other.
And I agree with your final paragraph.
Don’t remeber Ghandi fearing persecution. What about the Dhali Lama? He was EXCILED and was still changing the world for the better, so oh do tell, what has Hamas done while based in Qatar and Turkey except fearing for their butts.
And I would say that to any Palestinian that complains that the Arabs are cowards and don’t support Palestine enough, especially the ones that made it big time in the west that they blame for the conflict and hardly make any donations or do anything that changes the situation.
Why do I feel your 15 yrs old
Ahmed yacinne one of the previous leaders of Hamas was assassinated over there (one of many)! sometimes you need to administrate from overseas to guarantee your work is done fully!
Gaza is Israel’s open air prison for Palestinians guilty only of their ethnicity. The apartheid Jewish state with the world’s fourth most powerful military has incarcerated them, baits them, and enjoys a near one hundred to one kill ratio. Any retaliation the Palestinians are able to wreak upon their racist Jewish captors is both justifiable and commendable. Our United States of America giving the Jews money, weapons, or any assistance whatsoever for their continuing land theft and ethnic cleansing (killing) is cruel and criminal.
Besieged Palestinian Gaza is an experiment in provocation. Stuff one and a half million people into a tiny space, stifle their access to water, electricity, food and medical treatment, destroy their livelihoods, and humiliate them regularly…and, surprise, surprise – they turn hostile. Now why would you want to do that experiment? Because the hostility you provoke is the whole point. Now under attack you can cast yourself as the victim, and call out the helicopter gunships and the F16 attack fighters and the heavy tanks and the guided missiles, and destroy yet more of the pathetic remains of infrastructure that the Palestinian state still has left. And then you can point to it as a hopeless case, unfit to govern itself, a terrorist state, a state with which you couldn’t possibly reach an accommodation. And then you carry on as usual with ethnic killing and stealing their homeland.
Very true, he Palestinians don’t fight for a noble cause or the advancement of the Arab peoples, they fight because they have nothing left to lose.
Apparently to Tayip Erdogen, killing 300 Palestinians is genocide, but killing more 1 million Armenians is not.
Don’t raise uncomfortable truths from history, it doesn’t suit their narrative….
Do you mean that killing of 300 (actual number is much greater) Palestinians does not count?
With regard to “killing more 1 million Armenians”: a) number is not verified; b) Ottomans acted against ethic Armenian population, who sided with Russians trying to invade the empire (US did the same against Japanese during WW2); c) if “more 1 million” died, there would have been no strong armenian lobby in US, France, etc.; d) in any case, Armenians declined Erdogan’s offer to open the state archives and leave it up to historians to decide who did what
If Israel and Egypt are unhappy, it probably means you’re on the right track
So what Israel and Egypt? Both great models of freedom, justice, equality and human rights….let them be annoyed!
Lieberman accused Qatar for influencing Hamas not to accept Egypt’s ceasefire proposal when Hamas clearly did not accept it on the first place for being a lopsided agreement. See how this monster trying to pour more gasoline on already a fire between Egypt and Qatar. And I second Turkey.
Hmm the issue is of two historically rival enemies….This will happen till the end of days….Throughout history one becomes more powerfull than the other….Philistines after Mohammed became a Islamic nation to join hands with the Arabs in conquering Israel.Its called Palestine later….Jews lost their temple over which the philistines built a mosque….The Jews still worship in the wailing wall…Remains of Solomons temple….How much more disgraced can they be….Jews would accept negotiations from a neutral country ,not a Muslim one….If this fight has to end neutral but powerfull ND friendly countries to Israel like India which still has the highest Muslim population should raise a platform for talks….not Qatar or turkey…Qatar hasn’t even open its boundries for Jewish people,how can they propose peace????Same with turkey …..Hamas was contacted by Egypt …..why dint they accept talks if they cared about their citizens…..What was the Hamas leader doing in Qatar..dint he see theceasefire offer…..
wait… there is a similarity for these two nations…both were headed by Jewish ….Israel – Nethenyahu…
Egypt–Al Sisi… So they might be annoyed…. if anyone of you think that sisi is not jewish…do a research on his origin…His mother is Jew. his uncle still works in Israel military…
So Is that kind of like the “Grand Master” of the Klu Klux Klan who’s grandmother is black?
and “spoke to senior officials in the US, France and Norway”, i wonder what happened to gulf countries and other Arab countries. – UNITY is power.
Unity with the devil is clearly not!
If there were any Unity at all then we would not be having this conversation…
Indeed. Speaking of unity: http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/news/qatar/292061/uae-offered-to-fund-israel-s-gaza-offensive
Wow! sometime all you can say is WTF…
United arab nations for the sake of the religion of Allah s.w.thttp://mujahideenworld.blogspot.com/
Not gonna happen