Live: Israel delays release of 602 Palestinian prisoners

Dozens of Palestinian families fled on Monday from the Nur Shams refugee camp on the outskirts of Tulkarm in the north of the occupied West Bank as Israel pushed on with a sweeping military operation.

“We hear explosions and bombings as well as bulldozers. It’s a tragedy. They are doing here what they did in Gaza,” Ahmed Ezza, a resident, told AFP.

Ahmed Abu Zahra, another resident of the camp, said he was forced to leave his home.

“The [Israeli] army came and we were forced to leave after they started destroying our homes.”

Three Palestinians, including two women and a young man, were killed on Sunday in Nur Shams. One of the killed women was pregnant.

Hamas said on Monday that the next Gaza hostage-prisoner exchange may still take place as scheduled under the ceasefire deal with Israel, after the Hamas armed wing had announced an indefinite postponement.

"Hamas has intentionally made this announcement five days before the scheduled prisoner handover, allowing mediators ample time to pressure the (Israeli) occupation towards fulfilling its obligations. The door remains open for the prisoner exchange batch to proceed as planned, once the occupation complies”, a statement by Hamas reads.

“We in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) condemn the decision of President Mahmoud Abbas to cancel the payment of financial allocations to the families of prisoners, martyrs and wounded, and to abandon their national cause, at a time when our people and resistance forces are working to preserve the rights of martyrs, liberate prisoners and provide a decent life for the liberated”, a statement, released by Hamas on Telegram, says.

Earlier on Monday, Abbas issued a decree revoking the payment system of “financial allowances for the families of Palestinian prisoners, martyrs and injured”.

In the statement, Hamas said Abbas's behaviour was “unpatriotic” and departs from “one of the national constants”.

It also accused Abbas of abandoning the prisoners at a “fateful moment in the history of our Palestinian cause”.

"We call for an immediate reversal of it, and not to submit to the pressures of the Zionist occupation and the American administration.” Hamas added.

Mediators fear a breakdown of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, two Egyptian security sources said on Monday after Hamas said Israel was not serious about executing the deal and announced it would stop releasing the remaining Israeli captives until further notice.

Hamas negotiators said US guarantees for the ceasefire were no longer in place, given a plan by President Donald Trump to displace Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, and mediators postponed talks until a clear indication of Washington's intent to continue the phased deal was received.

Earlier on Monday, Hamas military spokesperson Abu Obaida said the delay would continue until Israel halted its attacks on Palestinians returning to their homes in Gaza and allowed aid into the enclave at previously agreed levels.

US President Donald Trump said that Palestinians would not have the right to return to the Gaza Strip under his proposal to “take over” the enclave, according to excerpts from a Fox News interview.

“I’m talking about building a permanent place for them because if they have to return now, it’ll be years before you could ever - it’s not habitable. It would be years before it could happen”, a transcript from the interview released on Monday reads.

Asked if Palestinians would have the right to return, Trump told Fox: “No, they wouldn’t because they’re going to have much better housing,” the transcript said.

Trump also said he thought he could make a deal with Jordan and Egypt to take the displaced Palestinians, saying, “We give them billions and billions of dollars a year.”

In a shock announcement last week, Trump proposed to displace the population of Gaza permanently.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has issued a decree revoking the payment system of “financial allowances for the families of Palestinian prisoners, martyrs and injured”, the text of the decree published on Monday by the official gazette reads.

No reason was given for the restructuring of the welfare system. 

Hamas said it would delay the release of the next tranch of Israeli captives "until further notice", accusing Israel of failing to comply with the terms of the ceasefire deal.

The movement was due to release some Israelis on Saturday in exchange for Palestinian prisoners and detainees.

However, Abu Obaida, spokesman for Hamas's armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, said it will be "postponed until further notice, pending the occupation's compliance and retroactive fulfilment of the past weeks' obligations".

"We reaffirm our commitment to the terms of the agreement as long as the occupation adheres to them," he added.

Abu Obaida said the delay would continue until Israel halted its attacks on Palestinians returning to their homes in Gaza and allowed aid into the enclave at previously agreed levels.

Israel's defence minister, Israel Katz, said Hamas's move was "a complete violation of the ceasefire agreement and the deal to release the hostages".

He said he had instructed the military "to prepare at the highest level of alert for any possible scenario in Gaza". 

Read more: Hamas delays captive release 'until further notice' accusing Israel of violating terms

US President Donald Trump said Palestinians would have no right of return to Gaza under his plan for the United States to take over the territory.

"No, they wouldn't, because they're going to have much better housing," Trump told Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier when asked if the Palestinians would have the right to return. 

"In other words, I'm talking about building a permanent place for them."

Mountains of rubble and debris line the roads in Khiam, on Lebanon’s eastern border with Israel. Months of heavy fighting between Hezbollah and Israel have left most of the town unrecognisable. 

The buildings still standing are ridden with bullet holes. Some walls and doors have been entirely blasted off, revealing overturned furniture inside. Others bore traces of the presence of Israeli soldiers, who had occupied the area for around six weeks before withdrawing on 12 December. 

Trash left by Israeli forces is littered throughout homes, and walls have been vandalised with provocative graffiti.

In one three-storey house, past the military schedules scrawled into the stairwell, Israeli soldiers had scattered their faeces in bags around the rooftop. 

Despite the destruction, Khiam’s residents are still returning. 

Read more: Lebanese find bones and memories of Israeli abuse in Khiam's ruins

Around 580 Palestinians were arrested by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank in January, according to an Al Jazeera report.

Local groups tracking Israel’s detention of Palestinian prisoners said in a joint statement that the highest number of cases were recorded in Jenin and its refugee camp, which Israel has been besieging for 21 days.

At least 60 children were among those arrested, along with 17 women, the groups said.

Israeli forces stormed Jalazone camp, north of Ramallah, on Monday, questioning the mother of Palestinian detainee Mohammed Rafiq Nakhleh, the Wafa news agency reported.

Nakhleh has been imprisoned for 20 years and is expected to be released as part of the ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel.

Local sources reported that Israeli soldiers also closed the shop of Nakhleh’s brother and raided a building where Nakhleh is due to arrive upon his release.

Israeli forces stormed Jalazone camp, north of Ramallah, on Monday, questioning the mother of Palestinian detainee Mohammed Rafiq Nakhleh.

Nakhleh has been imprisoned for 20 years and is expected to be released as part of the ceasefire agreement.

Local sources reported that Israeli soldiers also closed the shop of Nakhleh’s brother and raided a building where Nakhleh was due to arrive upon his release.

The Lebanese army has completed its deployment in the towns of Rab Thalatheen, Taloussa and Bani Hayyan after the Israeli army withdrew from them, the country’s National News Agency reported.

The Lebanese army has conducted motorized patrols on the roads, removing dirt barriers and rubble, and searching for bombs and unexploded ordnance, the agency said.

The municipalities of the three towns called on citizens to adhere to the army's instructions and not to return until a second order.

The Kremlin says it is waiting for more details on the US president’s plan to buy the Gaza Strip, an idea that has sparked condemnation from many countries, Reuters news agency reported.

Trump said yesterday he was committed to buying and owning Gaza.

“It’s worth waiting for some details here if we’re talking about a coherent plan of action. We are talking about almost 1.2 million Palestinians who live there, and this is probably the main issue,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a conference call.

“These are the people who were promised a two-state solution to the Middle East problem by the relevant Security Council resolutions, and so on and so forth. There are a lot of questions like that. We don’t know the details yet, so we have to be patient,” said Peskov.

Israeli forces detained the owners of the Scientific Library, Mahmoud and Ahmed Mona, and seized books during a raid on Salah al-Din Street in Jerusalem, according to the Wafa news agency.

Local sources said that the brothers were arrested on charges of disturbing public order by selling inflammatory books, and seized the books related to Palestine.

A week earlier, Israeli forces had closed the Jerusalem Library in the Khan al-Zeit market in the Old City and detained its owner, Hisham al-Akramawi, on similar charges.