Hamas has warned this Sunday that none of the hostages it took in its attack against Israel on October 7 and who remain captive in the Gaza Strip will be released, unless it is agreed to exchange them for Palestinians prisoners in Israel, as happened previously.

“None of the enemy’s captives have been released nor will they be released.or, except through an exchange operation,” Abu Obaida, spokesman for the Al Qasam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, said in a statement after Israeli ground troops tried – unsuccessfully – to rescue hostages in the Strip last Friday. .

Netanyahu calls on Hamas members to surrender

For his part, the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, has urged the militants of the Islamist group Hamas to surrender your weapons instead of dying for your leader Yahya Sinwar, who, according to Israeli authorities, is in the Gaza Strip. “I tell the Hamas terrorists: it’s over. Don’t die for Sinwar,” Netanyahu said, according to a statement released by his office, in which he assured that “the beginning of the end” of the Islamist group has arrived and that ” In recent days, dozens of Hamas terrorists have surrendered.”

Caught in the fighting, the situation of the Gazans worsens by the hour. Expelled from their homes, bombed, without water and without hospitals to go to if they are injured, they face, as the World Health Organization has warned, an inevitable scenario of epidemics.

The US leaves the duration of the offensive in Israel’s hands

Precisely, this Sunday the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, stated that The Government of Israel has absolute power to determine the duration of its offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, while regretting that the Israeli Army does not always fulfill its promise to protect the civilian population of the enclave.

“I am of the opinion that special emphasis must be placed when protect civilians and to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches those who need it. I believe that (Israel’s) intentions are there, but the results are not always manifest,” he indicated in an interview with the ‘CNN’ network.

Regarding the duration of the campaign, Blinken has indicated that “These kinds of decisions correspond to Israel”after recent reports about meetings between US and Israeli security officials in relation to military deadlines.

This week, US officials told CNN that they expect the current phase of Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza to last several weeks before Israel transitions, possibly in January, to a hyper-localized, lower-intensity strategy. which narrowly targets specific Hamas militants and leaders. Netanyahu has assured in this regard the operation against the enclave “will last as long as it takesuntil Hamas is eliminated.”