The Hamas terror group denies reports in Palestinian media that indirect talks with Israel include negotiations over a prisoner swap deal that would see Palestinian terror convicts released in exchange for two Israeli citizens and the bodies of two IDF soldiers believed to be held in the Gaza Strip.
According to Dunya al-Watan, a news site in Gaza, senior Hamas member Ismail Radwan says the talks also are not focusing on a long-term ceasefire deal, but rather on stabilizing the truce agreed on after Operation Protective Edge in 2014, the current conditions of Hamas prisoners in Israeli jails and the status of the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Temple Mount compound in Jerusalem.
Hamas political bureau leader Ismail Haniyeh (Hamas website)
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh says the group has conveyed — through Egyptian mediators — three demands regarding the prisoners, who have rioted recently, attacked guards and are threatening to start a hunger strike which would also see them stop drinking water.
The demands are that Israel stop blocking cellphone reception in the jails, stop the Israel Prisons Service’s “punishing” of security prisoners, and renew family visits.
Discover Israel's most beloved poet
She died more than four decades ago, but Leah Goldberg remains a magnetic and enigmatic figure: Israel’s most beloved poet, a powerful woman who lived with her mother and never married, who reinvented herself from the ashes of World War I through her magical writing.
You can screen 'The Five Houses of Leah Goldberg' June 4-11. Join The Times of Israel Community today to support our work and watch this and other outstanding documentary films in our DocuNation series.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you, David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, April 2, 2019
