President Joe Biden's national security adviser raised hopes Thursday for a Gaza ceasefire, saying Hamas negotiators "did adapt" after the announcement of a ceasefire deal in Lebanon. Hours later, local authorities reported Israeli airstrikes in both Lebanon and Gaza that killed dozens of people between them.
"For months, we believe Hamas was waiting for lots of other actors and forces to come to their rescue, to come to their aid," said national security adviser Jake Sullivan, who was in Tel Aviv as part of a whirlwind Mideast tour.
He added: "We believe that it puts us in a position to be able to close this negotiation."
That optimism was chased by reports of renewed Israeli action in both Gaza and Lebanon.
Lebanon's Health Ministry reported an airstrike that killed at least one person in the strategic southern Lebanon town of al-Khiam, a day after Israeli forces withdrew as part of a ceasefire agreement between Israel and the militant group Hezbollah.
And in Gaza, hospital officials reported that they took in 25 bodies from an Israeli strike at the Nuseirat refugee camp. Palestinian officials also reported two airstrikes that hit a force protecting humanitarian aid trucks, which killed 13 people, and a separate attack on a residential bombing that included children among its seven victims.
Israel’s withdrawal from Al-Khiam came two weeks after the start of the ceasefire brokered by the United States and France.
Lebanon's caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, sharply criticized the strike on the town less than 24 hours after the Lebanese army returned. Directing blame at the U.S. and France, he called it "a violation of the pledges made by the parties that sponsored the ceasefire agreement, who must act to curb Israeli aggression."
A day earlier, Mikati had praised the withdrawal as "a fundamental step toward strengthening the army's deployment in the south, in implementation of the ceasefire decision."
The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the strike at Nuseirat. Israel has said Hamas militants hide among Gaza’s civilian population. The Israeli military is trying to eliminate Hamas, which led the attack on southern Israel in October 2023 that sparked the war in Gaza.
The ceasefire halted months of intensified fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, which included Israeli ground operations inside Lebanon and airstrikes that killed multiple Hezbollah leaders. Hezbollah launched cross-border attacks against Israel in solidarity with Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip following the October 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel.
The U.N. General Assembly demanded on Wednesday an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip as well as the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages still being held by Palestinian militants.
"The message that it is sending is that we are with you," Palestinian envoy Riyad Mansour said after the vote. He added that it shows that Israel and its main backer, the United States, are more isolated internationally over the war.
The ceasefire resolution, which had 85 cosponsors, was adopted with 158 votes in favor and nine against, including the United States and Israel.
"The vote today is not a vote for compassion," Israel's ambassador, Danny Danon, said. "It is a vote for complicity." He said the resolution failed to directly link the release of the remaining 100 hostages held by Hamas with the ceasefire, saying that amounted to "appeasement."
The United States blocked a similar measure with its veto at the U.N. Security Council on November 20, saying that it could not support an unconditional ceasefire that did not come with the release of hostages.
It voted against the ceasefire resolution in the General Assembly on Wednesday on similar grounds, as well as a second resolution supporting UNRWA, the embattled U.N aid agency that assists Palestinian refugees.
"Colleagues, the messages we send to the world through these resolutions matter. And both of these resolutions have significant problems," U.S. Deputy U.N. Ambassador Robert Wood told the Assembly. "One rewards Hamas and downplays the need to release the hostages, and the other denigrates Israel without providing a path forward to increasing humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians."
The General Assembly previously has called for a ceasefire, but its resolutions, though they carry the moral weight of the majority of the international community, are nonbinding and have been ignored.