U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday cast doubt over a cease-fire in war-torn Gaza that he thought would be reached by Monday, adding that the shooting incident – in which Israeli forces opened fire on unarmed civilians, which killed over 100 Palestinians – at an aid point would likely complicate negotiations.
Biden said that the United States was checking “competing versions” of the incident in which the health ministry in the Palestinian enclave said Israeli troops shot dead 104 people.
Earlier this week, Biden had predicted a deal was possible by Monday to implement a cease-fire in Gaza in exchange for the release of hostages held by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.
“Hope springs eternal,” Biden told reporters when asked about the cease-fire timing as he left the White House for a pre-election trip to Texas to visit the U.S.-Mexico border.
“I was on the telephone with people in the region… Probably not by Monday, but I’m hopeful.”
The U.S. president said he did not yet have clarity on what happened in Gaza earlier Thursday when one of the worst single incidents of the nearly five-month conflict occurred.
“We’re checking that right now. There are two competing versions of what happened; I don’t have an answer yet,” Biden told reporters as he headed to his helicopter.
Asked if he was worried whether it would complicate the delicate negotiations for a cease-fire, Biden replied: “I know it will.”
The health officials in Gaza said Israeli forces there opened fire on a crowd of malnourished Palestinians at an aid distribution point Thursday, killing at least 104 people and wounding over 700.
Israeli sources confirmed that troops shot at a crowd rushing toward aid trucks, believing they “posed a threat” to Israeli troops.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, however, claimed many were crushed by the trucks themselves.
Israel has launched a deadly military offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 cross-border attack by Hamas in which less than 1,200 people were killed.
More than 30,000 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, and 70,457 others injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities, the Gaza health ministry said earlier Thursday.
Israel has also imposed a crippling blockade on the coastal enclave, leaving its population, particularly residents in the north where the shootings on Thursday took place, on the verge of starvation.
The Israeli war has pushed 85% of Gaza’s population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the U.N.
Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
The United States has backed Israel since Oct. 7 but has recently pushed for a ceasefire and a reduction in civilian casualties.
Hamas’s attacks resulted in the deaths of around 1,160 people, Israeli figures show. The group also took about 250 hostages, 130 of whom remain in Gaza, according to Israel.
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