Three-stage plan

Hamas presents draft for ceasefire with Israel

Palestinians flee Khan Younis at the end of January - fierce fighting is still raging in the town in the southern Gaza Strip.(Bild: Associated Press)

While fierce fighting continues to rage in the Gaza Strip, the terrorist organization Hamas has presented a three-stage plan for a ceasefire with Israel. Indirect talks are to take place in the first phase and the first hostages are to be released.

With this plan, Hamas is responding to the mediation efforts of Qatar and Egypt. Their aim is to put an end to Israel's military intervention, according to the draft, which was made available to the Reuters news agency on Wednesday. In addition, hospitals and refugee camps in the Gaza Strip are to be rebuilt.

Release of all hostages planned in second phase
Indirect talks are to take place in a first phase lasting 45 days. Israeli troops are to be withdrawn from the populated areas. Some civilian hostages are to be released in return for the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli custody. In a second phase, all remaining hostages are to be released - again in return for the release of Palestinians - and the Israeli military is to withdraw completely from the Gaza Strip. In a third phase lasting 45 days, the dead are to be exchanged.

Khan Younis attacked by paratroops
The Israeli army announced on Wednesday regarding the fighting in Khan Younis that "armed terrorist cells" had been eliminated and numerous weapons had been seized. "Israeli paratroopers have killed dozens of terrorists in Khan Younis over the past 24 hours," the statement said. For its part, the UN emergency aid office OCHA reported "intensive Israeli bombardment from the air, on the ground and from the sea in large parts of the Gaza Strip, especially in and around Khan Younis".

Relatives of Isreali hostages abducted by Hamas protest for the release of their loved ones.(Bild: AFP)

In an incident in the west of Khan Younis, Israeli soldiers encountered three gunmen who fired at them with anti-tank missiles, the military added. The three men and "several other terrorists were killed" in close combat. Large quantities of weapons were also found in the city in the south of the Gaza Strip and further tunnel shafts were uncovered. Hamas' armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, also described an attack on Israeli soldiers in the west of Khan Younis on Wednesday.

According to the Hamas-controlled health authority in the Gaza Strip, at least 27,585 people have been killed in the area since the beginning of the war. According to UN estimates, three quarters of the approximately 2.2 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip have had to flee their homes during the war.

Saudi Arabia insists on a Palestinian state
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia has informed the USA that there will be no diplomatic relations with Israel without the recognition of an independent Palestinian state. The country is demanding that a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital be recognized and that the "Israeli aggression" against the Gaza Strip must stop, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. The border demarcation must therefore correspond to the 1967 borders.

Jordan, which annexed the West Bank after the first Israeli-Arab war in 1948, had renounced the territories occupied by Israel since 1967 in 1988. In November of the same year, the Palestinian National Council (PNC) in Algiers proclaimed a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital.