US President Donald Trump has presented a plan to end the Gaza war in a meeting with Arab and Muslim leaders this week, his envoy said Wednesday, as Gaza’s civil defence agency reported dozens killed in Israeli attacks.
US envoy Steve Witkoff, who has been involved in months of mediation efforts seeking an end to the nearly two-year war, said Trump had detailed a “21-point plan for peace in the Mideast and Gaza” in Tuesday’s meeting with a group of leaders from Arab and Muslim nations.
“We’re hopeful, and I might say even confident, that in the coming days we’ll be able to announce some sort of breakthrough,” Witkoff told a summit on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
The plan “addresses Israeli concerns as well as the concerns of all the neighbours in the region”, he said without elaborating on the 21 points.
A joint statement from the governments represented in Tuesday’s meeting said the leaders had “reiterated their commitment to cooperate with President Trump, and stressed the importance of his leadership to end the war”.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanayahu said later Israel was not bound by a wave of recogitions of the State of Palestine, including by Australia, Britain, Canada and France.
“The shameful capitulation of some leaders to Palestinian terror does not obligate Israel in any way. There will be no Palestinian state,” he said.
On the ground, Israel pressed its assault on Gaza City which has displaced hundreds of thousands.
Israel says the major air and ground offensive aims to root out Hamas, the Palestinian militant group whose October 2023 attack sparked the war.
Thaer Saqr, 39, said his sister was killed as the family headed south from Gaza City.
“The tanks on the coastal road… opened fire on us, and my sister was killed,” he said after returning to the northern city.
From Al-Shifa Hospital, he said he “will not leave, even if they kill us all”.
The civil defence agency said hundreds of families have been sleeping on the ground for days after fleeing from northern Gaza, unable to secure temporary shelter.
“I appeal to the world: help us,” Saqr said. “I say to Israel: you want us to evacuate, but how can we when we have no shekels, no transportation, and no place to go?”
– ‘Pitiful sight’ –
The civil defence said Israeli attacks on Wednesday killed at least 40 people across Gaza, including 22 in a warehouse sheltering displaced people near the Firas market in Gaza City.
An AFP journalist said several children were among those pulled from the rubble.
Contacted by AFP, the Israeli military said it struck “two Hamas terrorists” in the north, where Gaza City is located, without offering more details.
Media restrictions in the territory and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the details provided by the civil defence or the Israeli military.
AFP footage showed Palestinians combing through large piles of rubble and warped metal following the attack.
In the aftermath, sobbing women knelt over their loved ones, hugging their lifeless bodies wrapped in white shrouds.
Mohammed Hajjaj, who lost relatives, said “heavy bombing” hit the building while people were asleep.
“We came and found children and women torn apart. It was a pitiful sight.”
Another eight people were killed by Israeli fire near an aid distribution centre close to Khan Yunis in the south, according to Gaza’s civil defence. Israel’s army told AFP it was unaware of the incident.
“These distributions are death traps,” Hosni Abu Amsha, a Palestinian whose nephew was killed, said in the aftermath.
– ‘Death was near’ –
In launching its US-backed ground offensive in Gaza City, the Israeli military told Palestinians to go to a designated “humanitarian area” in the south.
Israel has carried out repeated strikes on that area, Al-Mawasi, since declaring it a safe zone early in the war.
Mahmud al-Dreimly, 44, said on his way to find a tent for his family to shelter in Gaza City’s Al-Rimal neighbourhood, he “felt death was near”.
“I saw tanks firing into the air and sometimes at people,” he told AFP.
The intensification of the ground assault last week came as a UN probe accused Israel of committing “genocide” in Gaza. Israel rejected the findings.
Over nearly two years, Israeli military operations have killed at least 65,419 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, figures the UN considers reliable.
Hamas’s attack that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
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© Agence France-Presse
