Palestine weekly: Netanyahu hedges on Gaza roadmap

Israel has rejected the 15-point Gaza roadmap put forward by US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday, insisting that the Israeli army would not withdraw from the Palestinian territory until Hamas is fully disarmed.Hamas reaffirmed its own commitment to the roadmap on the same day, demanding guarantees on the ceasefire, Israeli withdrawal, aid and reconstruction.Board of Peace envoy Nickolay Mladenov said in an interview on Israel’s Channel 12 that any Israeli pullback would come incrementally from areas declared free of weapons, with international forces taking over ground Israel vacates, and that disarmament would ultimately extend to all armed groups in Gaza, not Hamas alone.Gaza: a public no, a quiet maybeIsrael’s rejection of the plan was nonetheless accompanied by discernible changes on the ground. The reported number of Palestinians killed in Gaza dropped sharply, from 47 between July 27 and August 3 – which includes the days immediately after Trump’s initial disarmament agreement announcement – to eight in the following week through August 10, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.Israeli Army Radio reported that Net...