Trump wants to declare a Gaza ceasefire ‘within days’ and says he ‘wants to stop the whole situation as quickly as possible’
Donald Trump wants to end the war in Gaza ‘as quickly as possible’, with sources reportedly saying he could announce a ceasefire ‘within the coming days’.
‘We want to see if we can stop it. And we’ve talked to Israel, we want to see if we can stop this whole situation as quickly as possible,’ the US President told reporters as he boarded Air Force One.
Meanwhile, Sky News Arabia and other news outlets in the region cited sources as saying that there is a growing likelihood that Trump will announce a ceasefire in the coming days.
It would come as part of a deal that would include the release of Israeli hostages, the anonymous ‘knowledgeable sources’ reportedly said.
Israel has been intensifying its offensive in the war-ravaged strip over recent weeks, at the same time as its three-month blockade of humanitarian supplies into Gaza has sharpened international condemnation.
Overnight Israel launched a strike on a school in the territory which had been sheltering displaced people, with rescuers saying at least 20 were killed in the attack.
Civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said that ‘at least 20 martyrs’ were transported to hospital, most of them children, and 60 people were wounded in the ‘horrific occupation massacre at the Fahmi al-Jarjawi school’ at dawn, where hundreds of people were sheltering, referring to Israel.
The Israeli military said it had ‘struck key terrorists who were operating within a Hamas and Islamic Jihad command and control center embedded in an area that previously served as the ‘Faami Aljerjawi’ School’.
It claimed that ‘numerous steps were taken to mitigate the risk of harming civilians’.
Gaza’s health ministry said on Sunday that at least 3,785 people had been killed in the territory since a ceasefire collapsed on March 18
‘We want to see if we can stop it. And we’ve talked to Israel, we want to see if we can stop this whole situation as quickly as possible,’ the US President told reporters
The day before, Israeli strikes killed 22 people and wounded dozens more across the Palestinian territory, the Gaza civil defence agency said.
Arab and European nations gathered yesterday to seek an end to the conflict while Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares called for an arms embargo on Israel.
He also called for humanitarian aid to enter Gaza ‘massively, without conditions and without limits, and not controlled by Israel’, describing the territory as humanity’s ‘open wound’.
It comes after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Sir Keir Starmer and the leaders of France and Canada of siding with Hamas after they shared a joint statement issued last week denouncing Israel’s ‘disproportionate’ escalation.
Monday’s joint statement had been welcomed by Hamas, who described the stance as ‘an important step’ in the right direction toward restoring the principles of international law.
Gaza’s health ministry said on Sunday that at least 3,785 people had been killed in the territory since a ceasefire collapsed on March 18, taking the overall death toll to 53,939 – most of whom are civilians.
Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.
Militants also took 251 hostages, 57 of whom remain in Gaza, including 34 who the Israeli military says are dead.
