HE the Foreign Minister Dr Khalid bin Mohamed al-Attiyah with US Secretary of State John Kerry and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as they walk down the stairs of the Turkish ambassador’s residence in Paris yesterday.
AFP
Paris
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US Secretary of State John Kerry and top diplomats from Europe and the Middle East meeting in Paris yesterday called for an extension to a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas.
But Hamas said it had fired several rockets at Israel from the Gaza Strip, after a 12-hour humanitarian ceasefire in the embattled Palestinian territory, despite a four-hour Israeli extension.
The movement’s armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam brigades, said in three separate statements it had fired two rockets at Tel Aviv in central Israel, five at Nachal Oz in the south, and another five at the southern city of Ashkelon.
The fire came shortly after a 12-hour humanitarian truce window expired, with Israel having agreed to suspend its bombardment of Gaza from 8am to 8pm local time.
“We all call on parties to extend the humanitarian ceasefire currently in force, by 24 hours that could be renewed,” France’s Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters after the Paris meeting.
“We all want to obtain a lasting ceasefire as quickly as possible that addresses both Israeli requirements in terms of security and Palestinian requirements in terms of socio-economic development,” said Fabius, who went on to brief Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the phone.
Kerry and Fabius met with their counterparts from Qatar, Britain, Germany, Italy and Turkey, as well as a representative from the European Union.
“The massacres are unbearable, they cannot continue,” said a top French diplomat who refused to be named.
“We hope that this morning will be the start of a positive cycle that will allow a lasting ceasefire in order to negotiate the conditions of a permanent truce to go towards peace.”
Kerry, who has been leading international efforts to reach a ceasefire, has been in regular contact with the foreign ministers of Turkey and Qatar.
But both Israel and Hamas remain at odds over the shape of a final deal.
Hamas says any truce must include a guaranteed end to Israel’s eight-year blockade of Gaza and also wants Egypt to open its Rafah border crossing with the coastal enclave, the only passage not controlled by Israel.
The Jewish state, meanwhile, is adamant that it wants to destroy an apparently sophisticated network of tunnels through which Hamas resistance fighters can infiltrate from Gaza to wage attacks.
“The tunnels have to be dealt with, we understand that - we’re working at that,” Kerry said yesterday.
“By the same token, the Palestinians can’t have a ceasefire in which they think the status quo is going to stay,” he said, calling for a deal in which Palestinians “live with dignity” with freedom of movement and free from violence.
Qatar’s Foreign Minister HE Dr Khalid bin Mohamed al-Attiyah added that it was critical to find ways to end the Israeli blockade on Gaza.
“They deserve to have their own port - a seaport - so they can trade in and out, even if it is under international supervision,” he said.
“But I think the time now comes that we have to have a long-term solution for the people of Gaza who have been suffering for a long time,” al-Attiyah said.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said aid would be a top priority if Israel and Hamas agreed to extend the temporary truce.
“We also need to use this time to prepare negotiations for a lasting ceasefire,” he said after the meeting.
Hamas insists that Turkey and Qatar be involved in any ceasefire negotiations.
Egypt’s foreign minister was absent from the Paris meeting, which France dismissed by saying that Egypt was still closely associated with the talks.
The conflict in Gaza, which erupted on July 8 when Israel launched a vast aerial campaign and followed that with a ground offensive, has killed more than 1,000 Palestinians, 40 Israeli soldiers and three civilians inside Israel.
