SIDON, Lebanon, Aug 22, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - The Israeli military killed a
senior Palestinian in Lebanon on Wednesday, leading to accusations
from the Fatah movement that Israel was trying to ignite a regional war.

The strike that killed Khalil Maqdah, described by Fatah as "one of the
leaders" of its armed wing in Lebanon, came hours after US Secretary of State
Antony Blinken ended a tour of the Middle East aimed at reaching a ceasefire
in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.

On Wednesday, US President Joe Biden called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu and "made clear that we must bring the ceasefire and hostage
release deal to closure," the president wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Fatah, which is based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and rivals the Gaza
Strip's Islamist rulers Hamas, said Maqdah was killed near the southern
Lebanese city of Sidon.

Israel accused him of "directing attacks and smuggling weapons" to the West
Bank and collaborating with Iranian forces.

His killing marked the first time Israel has targeted a senior Fatah member
in more than 10 months of cross-border clashes with Lebanese,
mostly from Hezbollah, during the Gaza war.

Tawfiq Tirawy, a member of Fatah's central committee, told AFP that the
"assassination... is further proof that Israel wants to ignite a full-scale
war in the region".

Blinken, who left Qatar late Tuesday apparently empty-handed, appealed to
Hamas to urgently accept a US-drafted truce proposal, while also publicly
disagreeing with Israel over its future presence in the besieged Gaza Strip.

"Time is of the essence," Blinken said before flying out of Doha after stops
in Egypt and Israel.

A ceasefire "needs to get done, and it needs to get done in the days ahead,"
he said.

- Father mourns -

On the ground, Gaza was again rocked by air strikes, according to AFP
reporters, first responders, witnesses and the Israeli military, which also
issued fresh evacuation orders.

The civil defence agency in the Hamas-run territory said at least three
people were killed and 10 children wounded in an Israeli strike on a school-
turned-shelter in Gaza City.
Israel's military said the "precise strike" targeted Hamas based in
the school compound.
A father told AFP his child was killed in the strike while playing in the
schoolyard.
"What did this child do to deserve this?" he said, declining to give his
name.

Israeli bombardment elsewhere in Gaza killed at least 24 people on Wednesday,
the civil defence agency said.

Israel and Hamas have blamed each other for delays in agreeing a deal to end
fighting, triggered by Hamas's October 7 attack, as well as freeing Israeli
hostages and allowing vital humanitarian aid into Gaza.

The United States has presented ideas to bridge gaps and, through mediators
Qatar and Egypt, pressed Hamas to return to talks this week in Cairo.

But a day after Blinken said US ally Israel was on board, Netanyahu was
quoted by Israeli media as disagreeing on a key sticking point.

Netanyahu insisted Israel maintain control of the Philadelphi Corridor, the
border between Gaza and Egypt that Israeli forces seized from Hamas, which
Israel says relies on tunnels to bring in weapons.

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant toured Philadelphi on Wednesday, his
office said.

Since the war began, it was made "very clear that the United States does not
accept any long-term occupation of Gaza by Israel", Blinken said when asked
about Netanyahu's remarks.

But he added that Israel had already agreed on the "schedule and location" of
troop withdrawals from Gaza in the talks. Details have not been made public.

Hamas said it was "keen to reach a ceasefire" but protested "new conditions"
from Israel in the latest US proposal.

- 'Bring them all back' -

The October 7 attack on southern Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,199
people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli
official figures.

Israel's retaliatory military campaign has killed 40,223 Palestinians in
Gaza, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry, which does not
give details of civilian and Hamas deaths. The UN rights office says most
dead are women and children.

Palestinian also seized 251 hostages, of whom 105 remain in Gaza
including 34 the military says are dead.

The military's latest evacuation orders, including for parts of central and
southern Gaza previously designated "safe" by Israel, affect some 150,000
displaced Palestinians who had sought shelter there, the United Nations'
humanitarian agency OCHA said.

A UN official said death "seems to be the only certainty" for Gaza's 2.4
million people, with no way to escape Israel's bombardment.

"Absolutely nowhere is safe," Louise Wateridge, a spokeswoman for the UN
agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), told AFP from Gaza.

In Lebanon, Hamas ally Hezbollah claimed attacks on Israeli military
positions across the border including in the annexed Golan Heights, after
several Israeli strikes that the health ministry said had killed five people.

Fears of a wider regional conflagration soared after the late July killings,
blamed on Israel, of Iran-aligned leaders in Tehran and in Beirut.

Netanyahu, at an airbase in northern Israel, said "we are ready for any
scenario."

Mourners meanwhile gathered in southern Israel to bury one of six dead
hostages recovered from Gaza by Israeli forces this week.

Yagev Buchshtab's mother Esther, echoing calls for Netanyahu to secure a
hostage release deal, said: "In what world must families beg, scream and cry
for the return of their loved ones, alive or murdered? Bring them all back."