Tuesday, April 16, 2019

Ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas

 The Gaza Strip or just Gaza is governed by an organization called Hamas, which is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamist fundamentalist organization, sustaining itself by having its own military wing and a social service department.  

  On Tuesday Hamas released that they had been made aware of a timeline from Israel on the ceasefire agreement the two sides had been working on. During talks in the Gaza Strip, Egyptians gave Israel the demands Hamas had asked for in order to come together for a ceasefire, including the removal of signal jammers and sanctions against Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. As well, the fishing zone has already been expanded to the 28 kilometers that were asked for, and including the ability to cross between the borders of Israel and the Gaza Strip was allowed. With the money funded to Hamas from Qatari, Hamas also asked Egypt and Qatar to help get rid of sanctions against Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails after the meeting between the UN envoy for the Middle East, Nickolay Mladnenov and Hamas leaders did not come to the resolutions they were hoping for. As well on the Israel side, a vote had not been taken in the cabinet about the agreement over a ceasefire but nothing could be resolved until the two Israeli civilians would be returned to their homes as well as the remains of two fallen Israeli soldiers. All these demands are in hopes of an agreement to end the violence and start a new wave of peace in the region.  

  When it comes to the article, “Hamas: We Received Timeline for Ceasefire with Israel,” written by Khaled Abu Toameh, the viewpoint of Toameh is hard to find because of his use of neutral language when it comes to discussing the issues of the ceasefire. Throughout the article Toameh keeps his biases to himself and is just reporting the facts and information that he is aware of and that is factual. I do believe that his viewpoint is from that of a Palestinian civilian who may be a supporter of Hamas, or just someone who wants the violence to stop. In the article, most of the topics discussed are from the Hamas point of view or talking about their wants, demands or feelings towards the things needed in order to agree on a ceasefire. His discussion is limited on the side of Israel, only discussing the fact that no agreement will be made unless the two Israeli civilians were returned as well as the remains of the two Israeli soldiers who died in an operation in 2014.  

  The reliability of the data in this article could be up for question, since Toameh reports most of the facts from sources. Specific sources are not always given, except for quotes from United Nations Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov about the discussions that took place in Gaza. In other examples Toameh says things like, said the sources or according to an Israeli source allowing us to debate is the information given to us coming from a person who is involved or at least a part of the talks, or just someone of Israeli descent talking about the ceasefire agreement. As well the reliability of the data could also be up for debate because Toameh repeats himself quite a few times when discussing the topic, showing that there might not truly be enough information to report on yet. Most of the sources Toameh would report from would also say that no agreement has truly been made or voted on by either side, leaving not only much discussion for the leaders to have, but giving the population not enough information to really understand what is happening. 

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