Turkey has called on Israel to stop repeatedly violating the United States-brokered ceasefire in Gaza and allow crucial humanitarian aid to flow into the Palestinian enclave.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan made the statement after top diplomats from several Arab and Muslim countries met in Istanbul on Monday to discuss a UN mandate for an international stabilization force in Gaza. 20-point plan US President Donald Trump to end the war.
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Turkey hosted the foreign ministers of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Pakistan and Indonesia at the summit.
After the meeting, Fidan said Israel had failed to meet its obligations under the US plan by “routinely violating the ceasefire” and preventing the delivery of food, medicine and other humanitarian aid. Palestinians in Gaza.
“We don’t want the genocide in Gaza to resume, we want the ceasefire to continue and we want to take steps towards a two-step, lasting peace solution,” Fidan said.
“We believe that the international community must maintain pressure on Israel,” he said, adding that about 250 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since the ceasefire took effect on October 10. Al Jazeera’s own coverage tracked at least 236 such deaths.
Turkey’s top diplomat said his country wants to see a post-war framework for Gaza in which Palestinians ensure Palestinian governance and security. He added that his comments reflected the “combined approach” of nations participating in Monday’s summit.
“Attacks that try to provoke the Palestinians must stop as soon as possible,” he said.
A teetering truce
Monday’s meeting comes amid Israeli attacks on Gaza and an ongoing blockade on aid, including food and medicine.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Strike started across Gaza last week after a body handed over to Israel by Hamas was found to not match one of the 13 detainees handed over as part of a ceasefire deal. The attacks killed more than 100 people, including 46 children, within 24 hours.
Although Israel said on Wednesday it would resume the deal, its attacks continue to kill Palestinians. including three More on Monday.
Aid distribution remains inadequate, with half of Gaza’s households reporting that they have seen the same or worsening access to food since the ceasefire, according to a survey by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) released this week. In the north, no food aid convoys have entered through the direct crossing since mid-September, OCHA said.
Meanwhile, the Gaza government media office said it tracked an average of 145 aid-carrying trucks entering the Gaza Strip each day between October 10 and October 31 – representing just a quarter of the 600 trucks agreed to in the ceasefire agreement.
‘Nothing is clear’ about Gaza mandate
Trump’s Gaza deal proposed the creation of the so-called International Stabilization Force (ISF), an international body to oversee security in Gaza. The plan said the U.S. would “work with Arab and international partners to train and support vetted Palestinian police forces in Gaza,” relying on consultations with Jordan and Egypt.
But “nothing is clear” about the mandate, Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu reports from Istanbul, as potential participating nations await more details from the UN Security Council on the exact definition and requirements of the ISF.
Further complicating matters is which “international partners” will allow Israel to be part of the ISF. Last week, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said that Israel would not accept the presence of armed Turkish troops and raised the question of whose troops could be called in or rejected as peacekeepers.
Netanyahu appeared to distance himself from Trump over the meaning of the ISF, even as he agreed to the plan. During a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Trump told reporters that “Israel will retain security responsibility with a security perimeter for the foreseeable future”.
Miroslav Zafirov, a former senior political adviser at the Office of the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, told Al Jazeera that the ISF must be defined “according to very clear standards under international law” to be effective.
“Many elements of the peace proposal remain unanswered,” Zafirov said.
Turkish Foreign Minister Fidan said the international community “overestimated” Israel’s readiness to take a path towards a two-state solution.
“Israel has never agreed to this and has never intended to ratify it,” he said. “But the international community has weighed in on this understanding.”