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Israel Gaza live updates: IDF says it controls Gaza side of Rafah crossing - BBC News Israel Gaza live updates: Gaza choked off from aid, says UN, with southern crossings closed - BBC News
(32 minutes later)
We can bring you more now on the Israeli position on the ceasefire deal offered by Qatari and Egyptian mediators, which Hamas said yesterday it was prepared to accept.
As we've been reporting, the Rafah and Kerem Shalom crossings - the key entry points for aid into Gaza - remain shut, cutting off aid deliveries into the Gaza Strip, the UN says. An Israeli official briefed on the talks says a mid-level Israeli delegation is due to hold talks in Cairo this evening.
A spokesperson for the United Nations' humanitarian office, Jens Laerke, says both crossings fall within the evacuation zone, which means "the two main arteries for getting aid into Gaza are currently choked off". The delegation is there to see if they can negotiate some "new answers", the official says.
Israeli officials told the UN that there will be no crossings of personnel or goods in or out of the Rafah crossing "for the time being", Laerke says. According to the official, there are four aspects of the proposal that Hamas has agreed to which Israel takes issue with:
Kerem Shalom crossing was closed after a rocket attack by Hamas fighters over the weekend killed four Israeli soldiers in the area. Hamas then targeted the crossing in another attack on Tuesday morning. The document refers to the end of the war, described as a permanent ceasefire, according to the official
Laerke adds that there is just one day of fuel left to sustain the UN's entire operation in Gaza. They believe it would see female soldiers released too late in the process
He also criticises Israel's evacuation notice, saying there was not enough warning to civilians and the UN was not informed before it warned Palestinians to evacuate eastern parts of Rafah ahead of the strikes. They say the document references a contingency that if 33 living hostages cannot be found for the first phase, then bodies can be substituted instead, which the Israeli official said is unacceptable
He adds there is no safe passage to the new humanitarian zone, and says that those on the ground have told him of "massive bombs lying in the street" in Khan Younis. Israel believes it would obliged to release an agreed number of prisoners from a list that Hamas will provide, with no power of veto for any individual case
A reminder - we have not had confirmation from Hamas or the mediators as to what is included in the deal currently on the table. We do know that Israel also already dismissed it as "far from meeting" its "core demands".
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