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Israel, Hamas Dig In as Pressure Builds03/27 06:08

   Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday blasted a United 
Nations Security Council resolution calling for a Gaza cease-fire that his 
country's top ally, the United States, chose not to block. He said the 
resolution had emboldened Hamas and he vowed to press ahead with the war.

   JERUSALEM (AP) -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday 
blasted a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a Gaza 
cease-fire that his country's top ally, the United States, chose not to block. 
He said the resolution had emboldened Hamas and he vowed to press ahead with 
the war.

   As the war grinds through a sixth month, both Israel and Hamas have rejected 
cease-fire efforts, each insisting its version of victory is within reach. The 
passage of the U.N. resolution has also escalated tensions between the U.S. and 
Israel over the conduct of the war.

   Netanyahu has said Israel can only achieve its aims of dismantling Hamas and 
returning scores of hostages if it expands its ground offensive to the southern 
city of Rafah, where over half of Gaza's population has sought refuge, many in 
crowded tent camps. The U.S. has said a major assault on Rafah would be a 
mistake.

   Hamas says it will hold onto the hostages until Israel agrees to a more 
permanent cease-fire, withdraws its forces from Gaza and releases hundreds of 
Palestinian prisoners, including top militants. It said late Monday that it 
rejected a recent proposal that fell short of those demands -- which, if 
fulfilled, would allow it to claim an extremely costly victory.

   Netanyahu said in a statement that the announcement "proved clearly that 
Hamas is not interested in continuing negotiations toward a deal and served as 
unfortunate testimony to the damage of the Security Council decision."

   "Israel will not surrender to Hamas' delusional demands and will continue to 
act to achieve all the goals of the war: releasing all the hostages, destroying 
Hamas' military and governing capabilities and ensuring that Gaza will never 
again be a threat to Israel."

   Israel has killed over 32,000 Palestinians, around two-thirds of them women 
and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry, which does not distinguish 
between civilians and combatants in its tally. The fighting has left much of 
the Gaza Strip in ruins, displaced most its residents and driven a third of its 
population of 2.3 million to the brink of famine.

   The Israeli military announced Tuesday that an airstrike earlier this month 
killed Marwan Issa, the deputy leader of Hamas' armed wing in Gaza who helped 
plan the Oct. 7 attack. Issa is the highest-ranking Hamas leader to have been 
killed in Gaza since the start of the war. Military spokesperson Rear Adm. 
Daniel Hagari said Issa was killed when fighter jets struck an underground 
compound in central Gaza between March 9 and 10.

   An Israeli strike late Monday on a residential building in Rafah where three 
displaced families were sheltering killed at least 16 people, including nine 
children and four women, according to hospital records and relatives of the 
deceased. An Associated Press reporter saw the bodies arrive at a hospital.

   In the face of Hamas' demands for a more permanent cease-fire, Netanyahu has 
vowed to resume Israel's offensive after any hostage release and keep fighting 
until the militant group is destroyed. But he has provided few details about 
what would follow any such victory and has largely rejected a postwar vision 
outlined by the U.S.

   That approach has brought him into increasingly open conflict with President 
Joe Biden's administration, which has expressed mounting concern over civilian 
casualties -- though it has continued to supply Israel with crucial military 
aid and back Israel's aim of destroying Hamas.

   The passage of Monday's resolution by the U.N. Security Council resolution 
further deepened the divisions. The resolution called for the release of all 
hostages held in Gaza but did not condition the cease-fire on it. The Biden 
administration, which vetoed previous U.N. resolutions calling for a 
cease-fire, abstained in Monday's vote, allowing it to pass.

   In response, Netanyahu cancelled a planned visit by Israeli officials to 
Washington during which the U.S. side was set to propose alternatives to a 
ground assault in Rafah.

   The move raised criticism in Israeli media that Netanyahu was straining 
Israel's most important alliance in order to placate hard-liners in his 
governing coalition.

   "He is prepared to sacrifice Israel's relations with the United States for a 
short-lived political-media coup. He has completely lost it," Ben Caspit, a 
prominent columnist in the Israeli newspaper Maariv, wrote.

   He said Netanyahu has been trying U.S. patience by dragging his feet on 
ensuring more humanitarian aid gets into Gaza and on drawing up post-war plans. 
"Now, instead of doing everything to placate them, he is flailing about like a 
baby throwing a tantrum."

   Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, in Washington on a separate trip, 
held talks Tuesday with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and with top U.S. 
defense leaders.

   Ahead of the meeting, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin described civilian 
casualties in Gaza as "far too high" and aid deliveries as "far too low." But 
he also repeated the belief that Israel has the right to defend itself and the 
U.S. would always be there to help.

   Gallant said he told Blinken "that Israel will not cease operating in Gaza 
until the return of all the hostages. Only a decisive victory will bring to an 
end of this war."

   Hamas' top political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, said the U.N. resolution showed 
that Israel faces "an unprecedented (level of) political isolation" and was 
"losing its political cover" at the Security Council. He spoke at a news 
conference in Tehran after talks with officials in Iran, a key ally of Hamas.

   The war began on Oct. 7, when Hamas-led militants stormed across the border 
and attacked communities in southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly 
civilians, and abducting around 250 others. It is still believed to be holding 
about 100 hostages and the remains of 35 others, after most of the rest were 
freed in November in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners.

   The United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent several weeks trying to 
negotiate another cease-fire and hostage release, but those efforts appeared to 
have stalled.

   Majed al-Ansari, a spokesperson for the Foreign Ministry of Qatar, which is 
currently hosting the talks, told reporters that the negotiations were ongoing, 
without providing details.

   Hamas has previously proposed a phased process in which it would release all 
the remaining hostages in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the 
opening of its borders for aid and reconstruction, and the release of hundreds 
of Palestinian prisoners, including top militants serving life sentences.

 
 
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