One killed in Gaza as Turkish FM talks peace efforts with Hamas official

A Palestinian man has been killed, and several others injured, after an Israeli drone strike targeted a motorcycle west of the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, amid Israel’s continued violations of a “ceasefire” agreed to in October.

A medical source confirmed the death on Saturday of Eyad al-Motawwaq to the Anadolu news agency, as well as the injuries of an unspecified number of people.

An Israeli drone had struck the motorcycle west of the camp, outside the zones of Israeli military deployment under the so-called “ceasefire” agreement, witnesses told the agency.

Israel separately shelled the eastern areas of Gaza City’s Tuffah neighbourhood on Saturday, Anadolu reported, although no casualties have been confirmed.

Al Jazeera’s Tariq Abou Azzoum, reporting from Shati Camp in Gaza City on Friday, confirmed an earlier air strike on the area, despite it being in the Israeli-designated “green line” meant to mark a safe area for civilians. At least four people were injured.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said late on Saturday that at least four people were killed and 15 others injured in the Strip in the past 48 hours. Some victims remained under rubble as rescue teams laboured to reach them, it added.

Efforts to secure lasting peace

Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, starting from October 2023, has left 72,736 people dead and more than 172,000 injured. Some 90 percent of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure has also been destroyed, and almost all of Gaza’s two million population is displaced.

Since the “ceasefire” in October, at least 850 Palestinians have been killed and 2,433 others injured in Israeli attacks, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Israel’s military is presently occupying about 60 percent of Gaza’s territory, currently demarcated by a so-called “yellow line” buffer zone.

Truce talks between Israel and Hamas have stalled, with senior Israeli military officials pressing for a return to war because of Hamas’s stance against surrendering weapons. On Wednesday, an Israeli air strike killed Azzam al-Hayya, son of Hamas negotiator Khalil al-Hayya.

Meanwhile on Saturday, Turkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan met with Muhammad Darwish, head of Hamas’s advisory Shura Council, to discuss efforts to secure peace in Gaza, as well as initiatives to deliver humanitarian assistance to the Strip.

Sources at the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Anadolu that at the meeting in Ankara, Fidan declared Israel’s expanding presence in Gaza and its obstruction of urgently needed humanitarian aid deliveries as “unacceptable”.

Fidan also said the ongoing war in the region should not overshadow the Palestinian issue, and he reiterated Turkiye’s opposition to any attempts to force Palestinians to leave Gaza, Anadolu reported.