Hamas Decides to De-Escalate Tensions with Israel

Exploding incendiary balloons are prepared in al-Bureij, Gaza. (dpa)
Exploding incendiary balloons are prepared in al-Bureij, Gaza. (dpa)
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Hamas Decides to De-Escalate Tensions with Israel

Exploding incendiary balloons are prepared in al-Bureij, Gaza. (dpa)
Exploding incendiary balloons are prepared in al-Bureij, Gaza. (dpa)

Hamas has decided to reduce tensions with Israel by stopping clashes with Israeli soldiers on borders and halting the launch of incendiary balloons, informed Palestinian sources told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The group’s decision is part of an effort to avoid sabotaging Egyptian attempts to maintain calm in Gaza.

Sources revealed that Hamas had responded to a request to lower tensions by Egypt, which was enraged by the group’s latest escalation on Saturday.

The agreement between Cairo and Hamas follows Ismail Haniyeh, the group's politburo head, discussing recent Gaza developments with Egyptian officials.

“Haniyeh’s contacts with the brothers in Egypt came to relieve our people and resolve some outstanding issues,” said Hamas spokesman Abdelatif al-Qanou.

For Haniyeh, cooling the atmosphere is vital after Egyptian anger with Hamas’ escalations led to the closure of the Rafah border crossing on Monday. Egyptian authorities did not announce when they would reopen it.

Hamas had angered Egypt by implementing its plan for gradual escalation despite having promised Cairo that the group’s border marches would not lead to more violence.

On Saturday, Hamas kickstarted popular marches on Gaza's borders with Israel. These demonstrations led to confrontations and the two sides exchanging fire.

Israel then bombed Gaza and Hamas launched cross-border incendiary balloons.

The attacks set off fires in southern Israel on Monday and provoked retaliation from the Israeli military, which hit several Hamas targets on Monday evening.

The army said in a statement that “fighter jets struck a Hamas weapons manufacturing site in Khan Yunis, as well as a terrorist tunnel entrance in Jabalia.”

“A Hamas underground rocket launch site that is located adjacent to civilian homes and a school in Shejaiya, was also struck,” it added.

Earlier on Monday, Israel Fire and Rescue Services investigators determined that arson balloons launched from the Gaza Strip caused at least nine fires in southern Israel.



Israeli Army Orders Gaza City Suburb Evacuated, Spurring New Displacement Wave

A Palestinian man points at a damaged building in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on November 20, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
A Palestinian man points at a damaged building in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on November 20, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
TT

Israeli Army Orders Gaza City Suburb Evacuated, Spurring New Displacement Wave

A Palestinian man points at a damaged building in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on November 20, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
A Palestinian man points at a damaged building in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on November 20, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)

The Israeli military issued new evacuation orders to residents in areas of an eastern Gaza City suburb, setting off a new wave of displacement on Sunday, and a Gaza hospital director was injured in an Israeli drone attack, Palestinian medics said.
The new orders for the Shejaia suburb posted by the Israeli army spokesperson on X on Saturday night were blamed on Palestinian militants firing rockets from that heavily built-up district in the north of the Gaza Strip.
"For your safety, you must evacuate immediately to the south," the military's post said. The rocket volley on Saturday was claimed by Hamas' armed wing, which said it had targeted an Israeli army base over the border.
Footage circulated on social and Palestinian media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed residents leaving Shejaia on donkey carts and rickshaws, with others, including children carrying backpacks, walking.
Families living in the targeted areas began fleeing their homes after nightfall on Saturday and into Sunday's early hours, residents and Palestinian media said - the latest in multiple waves of displacement since the war began 13 months ago.
In central Gaza, health officials said at least 10 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes on the urban camps of Al-Maghazi and Al-Bureij since Saturday night.
HOSPITAL DIRECTOR WOUNDED BY GUNFIRE
In north Gaza, where Israeli forces have been operating against regrouping Hamas militants since early last month, health officials said an Israeli drone dropped bombs on Kamal Adwan Hospital, injuring its director Hussam Abu Safiya.
"This will not stop us from completing our humanitarian mission and we will continue to do this job at any cost," Abu Safiya said in a video statement circulated by the health ministry on Sunday.
"We are being targeted daily. They targeted me a while ago but this will not deter us...," he said from his hospital bed.
Israeli forces say armed militants use civilian buildings including housing blocks, hospitals and schools for operational cover. Hamas denies this, accusing Israeli forces of indiscriminately targeting populated areas.
Kamal Adwan is one of three hospitals in north Gaza that are barely operational as the health ministry said the Israeli forces have detained and expelled medical staff and prevented emergency medical, food and fuel supplies from reaching them.
In the past few weeks, Israel said it had facilitated the delivery of medical and fuel supplies and the transfer of patients from north Gaza hospitals in collaboration with international agencies such as the World Health Organization.
Residents in three embattled north Gaza towns - Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun - said Israeli forces had blown up hundreds of houses since renewing operations in an area that Israel said months ago had been cleared of militants.
Palestinians say Israel appears determined to depopulate the area permanently to create a buffer zone along the northern edge of Gaza, an accusation Israel denies.
Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed more than 44,000 people, uprooted nearly all the enclave's 2.3 million population at least once, according to Gaza officials, while reducing wide swathes of the narrow coastal territory to rubble.
The war erupted in response to a cross-border attack by Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, 2023 in which gunmen killed around 1,200 people and took more than 250 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.