Israel and the Hamas terrorist group are inching closer to resuming Washington-led peace negotiations as fighting intensifies both in Gaza and on the West Bank.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on July 5 reported that it was making military progress against Hamas—which controls Gaza—both in Gaza City near the Gaza Strip’s north end and in Rafah in the south.
The IDF said it had eliminated about 100 terrorists in the Shejaiya sector of Gaza City, dismantled more than 100 Hamas infrastructure sites, and located large amounts of weapons.
A terrorist on July 4 launched two missiles toward Kibbutz Nahal Oz, but was killed two minutes later in a strike from an Israeli aircraft, according to the IDF.
In Rafah, at the opposite end of the Gaza Strip, the IDF eliminated dozens of armed terrorists and dismantled booby-trapped structures.
“Over the past day, the IAF [Israeli Air Force] struck over 50 terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip, including booby-trapped structures, armed terrorist cells, and launch posts,” the IDF stated.
Included in the air force’s targets were combatants operating from two schools in Gaza City run by the U.N. Relief Works Agency, which aids Palestinians but has been accused by Israel of cooperating with Hamas and allowing the group to siphon off aid for military purposes.
The IDF identified the schools as the Alqahirah School in Al-Furqan and the Musa School in Dara Tuffah.
It said measures were taken to “mitigate harm to uninvolved civilians, including conducting aerial surveillance, using precise munitions, and additional intelligence measures.”
“The Hamas terrorist organization systematically violated international law, exploiting civilian structures and populations as human shields for its terrorist attacks against the state of Israel,” the IDF stated.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told President Joe Biden on July 4 that he would send a delegation—led by the chief of the Mossad spy agency, David Barnea—to resume stalled cease-fire negotiations.
Mr. Netanyahu met with his cabinet earlier on July 4, after Hamas responded on July 3 to a May proposal from President Biden.
Hamas has said any deal must end the nearly nine-month war and bring a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Israel has maintained that it will accept only temporary pauses in the fighting until Hamas is eradicated.
The fighting across the Gaza Strip shows the IDF involved in combat once more in north and central Gaza, areas that it previously said were pacified.
Fighting also intensified on July 5 in the West Bank city of Jenin and included an Israeli air strike. Palestinian authorities said four people were killed.
The clashes in Jenin came a day after an Israeli anti-settlement monitoring group said the government plans to build nearly 5,300 new homes in the West Bank, which many Israelis refer to as Judea and Samaria.
On July 4, 63 members of the Knesset, constituting a majority of the 120-member national parliament, signed a letter to their speaker declaring their opposition to any Palestinian state west of the Jordan River.
Mr. Netanyahu is scheduled to go to Washington later this month.
