New York, Oct 30 (UNI) Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, in a veiled jab at Hamas, accused the terror group of violating the October 9 ceasefire agreement with Israel, after its fighters attacked IDF personnel and killed one of the reserve officers in Rafah on Tuesday.
Though stopping short of directly naming the group, Al-Thani indirectly accused Hamas of triggering hostilities, referring to the terror group as "the Palestinian party."
The deadly incident in the Rafah area of the southern Gaza Strip was "very disappointing and frustrating" for Qatar, said al-Thani, who was giving an onstage interview at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City, reports Israeli media.
"What happened yesterday was a violation," al-Thani said, acknowledging that post the Hamas attack, mediators had expected the IDF to retaliate, in reference to the Tuesday and Wednesday attacks by the Israeli military.
On Tuesday, the Ground Forces targeted specific buildings, tunnel shafts, and underlying areas which they said were being used by Hamas, killing some of its fighters in the process, after which the Air Force proceeded to conduct multiple bombings across the war-ravaged Strip on Wednesday.
The Hamas operated Health Ministry in Gaza said that 104 people were killed in the IAF bombing, though they did not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
When asked who specifically was responsible for Tuesday's "violation," al-Thani responded, "The attack on the Israeli soldiers — that's basically a violation by the Palestinian party."
"Hamas has put (out) a statement that they are not in communication with this group (that carried out the attack)," he said. "We don't know yet (if that's true)."
The Qatari premier, elaborating on his statement, added that the Islamic terror group had given "conflicting statements" regarding the attack on Israeli troops, with one claim being that that the gunmen responsible for it had "lost communication" with the Hamas leadership and "didn't know what they were doing."
This was then contradicted by Hamas' leaders, who then claimed that perpetrators behind the ceasefire violations were not affiliated with them, and belonged to a different group "that is not related to them."
"It doesn't matter for us who did what; what matters to us… is making sure that this event doesn't… make this agreement collapse," al-Thani said, noting that both Israel and Hamas have subsequently expressed their desire for the ceasefire to hold.
The Qatari prime minister was also asked about Hamas's reluctance to disarm, as it is expected to, under the terms of US President Donald Trump's 20-point plan for Gaza. Implementing this demand, al-Thani acknowledged, will be "complex."
"It will be a complicated process…to go through the disarmament and the decommissioning, but it's part of the agreement," he said, referring to Trump's plan.
UNI ANV RB 1702