Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the US would not dictate to Israel as it wages its war against Hamas, softening the Biden administration’s criticism of the Israel Defense Forces’ conduct as he met senior leaders in Tel Aviv.

Negotiations to create a maritime corridor to transport essential goods to Gaza were making progress towards an agreement soon, according to Greek Foreign Minister Georgios Gerapetritis.

Israel ‘ready to pause fighting in return for hostages’

Israeli President Isaac Herzog told ambassadors from around the world the country was prepared to agree to a second humanitarian pause in fighting in exchange for the return of more hostages held by Hamas.

Hamas, the Islamic militant group considered a terrorist organisation by the US and European Union, still holds about 129 of the initial 240 or more people it abducted from Israel during its deadly attack on 7 October.

“I can reiterate the fact that Israel is ready for another humanitarian pause and additional humanitarian aid in order to enable the release of hostages,” Herzog said on Tuesday. “The responsibility lies fully with Sinwar and the leadership of Hamas,” he said, referring to the group’s leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar.

Hamas said in a statement on Telegram that it was “categorically rejecting” negotiations over prisoner exchanges while Israel’s attack on Gaza was ongoing. The group added, however, a willingness to engage with “any initiative that contributes to ending the aggression on our people, and opening the crossings to bring in aid”.

Almost 19,500 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since 7 October, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in the enclave, alongside widespread destruction of homes and other infrastructure. Israel says 1,200 people were left dead after the initial incursion by Hamas fighters, and has vowed to destroy the group to avoid a repeat attack. 

Israel has been pressed by the US, a key ally, to do more to limit civilian deaths, while France, Germany and the UK all called for a ceasefire over the weekend.

The latest Herzog and Hamas comments came amid reports that the US and others were trying to restart talks after a brief pause late last month.  

The Wall Street Journal reported that CIA Director William Burns travelled to Warsaw this week to meet his Israeli counterpart and the Qatari prime minister to discuss how to renew discussions. 

Hamas’ cheap, makeshift drones are outsmarting Israel’s hi-tech military

It wasn’t the eruption of rocket fire from Gaza that rattled soldiers at Israel’s southern frontier on 7 October. It was the unusual hum overhead that they hadn’t heard before. 

A fleet of drones that are available online for as little as $6,500 filled the skies above Israel’s $1-billion border fence. They were rigged to carry explosives and knock out cameras, communications systems and remote-controlled guns, setting the stage for the unprecedented massacre.

Militaries have been using drones in conflicts for more than two decades. Israel itself boasts one of the largest armies of unmanned aerial vehicles in the Middle East. Today, a new generation of cheap, commercially available systems — like the ones Hamas used in the 7 October attack — is emerging, challenging some of the world’s most technologically advanced forces.  

Hamas’s use of modified commercial drones to stage attacks — a strategy also used by Ukraine in the early days of Russia’s invasion — exposed a significant vulnerability in Israel’s vaunted air and ground defences. The tactics overwhelmed a far more advanced opponent, all on a shoestring budget.

A spokesperson for the Israeli army declined to comment on how it was countering drones or the failure of its early warning systems. “Questions of this kind will be looked into in a later stage,” after the war, the spokesperson said. 

The Israel Defense Forces use its UAV fleet for surveillance and bombing targets. They are also increasingly turning to drones in urban warfare in Gaza to scout out buildings and defuse explosives before sending in troops, according to Aviv Shapira, the chief executive officer of Xtend, which provides UAV operating systems to the US and Israeli militaries. 

Israel has already upgraded its Iron Dome system — which uses interceptors to protect against incoming short-range missiles — to detect large UAVs, but many Hamas drones are still able to slip through. The army is testing a laser-based system designed to intercept smaller ones and short-range rockets, although it won’t be ready for at least another year.

Some Israeli startups and tech volunteers have already drawn up new defences, as the army’s troops involved in the ongoing invasion of Gaza come under frequent DIY kamikaze drone attacks. Videos posted by Hamas’s military wing since the start of the war, which could not be independently verified, show drones dropping grenades on Israeli troops and damaging armoured vehicles. 

Hamas drone attacks remain a potent threat, according to Liran Antebi, a research fellow at the Israel-based Institute for National Security Studies.  

“It gives you the ability to use precise or guided munition, which is something that until several years ago, only very advanced countries could do,” Antebi said. “With a criminal mind and small equipment, you can do terrible things like the first attack of Hamas.” 

US announces new task force to counter Houthi Red Sea threat

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced a new maritime task force intended to protect commercial vessels travelling through the Red Sea from attacks by Houthi militants.

“The recent escalation in reckless Houthi attacks originating from Yemen threatens the free flow of commerce, endangers innocent mariners and violates international law,” Austin said on Monday. “This is an international challenge that demands collective action.”

Austin said the countries involved in the new task force — dubbed Operation Prosperity Guardian — include the US, the UK, Bahrain, Canada, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, the Seychelles and Spain. It will be run under the umbrella of a pre-existing grouping in the region, the Combined Maritime Forces, and the leadership of its Task Force 153, which focuses on the Red Sea.

The attacks in the Red Sea, which handles about 12% of world trade as a key waterway for goods and energy, have emerged as a fresh threat to global supply chains and an extension of the hostilities in the Gaza Strip, where Israel is vowing to stamp out Iran-backed Hamas. The US says the Houthis also are acting as proxies of Iran.

Greece sees Gaza maritime aid corridor deal in coming days

Negotiations to create a maritime corridor to transport essential goods to Gaza were making progress toward an agreement soon, according to Greek Foreign Minister Georgios Gerapetritis.

“We expect developments on this issue in the following days,” Gerapetritis said in an interview in Athens on Monday.

Greece, which is in talks with France and Cyprus among others, would “provide humanitarian aid primarily with its commercial fleet”, he said. If necessary, Greece was willing to send aid through military means, as it did in November when it sent a C-130 with pharmaceutical and medical supplies to Gaza through Egypt.

Several countries and international organisations have been seeking to boost supplies of humanitarian aid to Gaza by securing a sea path, as the Israel-Hamas war rages, but an accord has failed to materialise.   

“The sea corridor is an extremely difficult exercise because at the moment there is no safe port in the Gaza Strip for ships to dock,” Gerapetritis said.

US won’t dictate to Israel over war’s timeline, says Austin 

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the US would not dictate to Israel as it wages its war against Hamas, softening the Biden administration’s criticism of the Israel Defense Forces’ conduct as he met senior leaders in Tel Aviv.

“This is Israel’s operation, and I’m not here to dictate timelines or terms,” Austin told reporters at a briefing alongside his Israeli counterpart, Yoav Gallant. “Our support to Israel’s right to defend itself is ironclad.” At the same time, he called the protection of Palestinian civilians “a moral duty and a strategic imperative.”

Even so, Austin’s tone was markedly softer than the one he took earlier in the month, when he said in a speech that Israel risked radicalising the people of Gaza if it didn’t do more to stop civilian deaths. That, he said, would “replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat.”    

Speaking alongside Austin, Gallant refused to accept the idea of a timeline. But he said Israel was close to being able to distinguish between different areas in Gaza and could transition to a phase that allowed some of the local population to return. 

“We will prevail and dismantle Hamas,” Gallant said on Monday. “Otherwise we won’t be able to exist.”

Austin’s supportive remarks marked a turn from last week when President Joe Biden warned at a fundraiser in Washington that Israel risked losing international support for its campaign against Hamas due to what he called “indiscriminate” bombing of targets in Gaza.

Even as he took a less critical line toward Israeli military operations in Gaza, Austin pressed the US case for the eventual creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

“Israelis and Palestinians have both paid too bitter a price to just go back to October 6,” Austin said. DM