Israel withdraws from strategic Gaza road

• Gaza rescuers say Israeli forces kill three Palestinians
• Israeli forces kill two women in West Bank raid
• Thai hostages freed from Gaza arrive in Bangkok

A Hamas official said Israeli troops completed their withdrawal yesterday from a strategic road cutting through the Gaza Strip, part of a fragile truce deal that Israel said it was implementing.

But diplomatic tensions were high after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared to suggest in an interview that a Palestinian state could be established on Saudi territory, drawing the ire of Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations.

As negotiations are set to begin on the next phase of the Gaza ceasefire, which is intended to pave the way for a permanent end to the war, Palestinians yesterday were able to cross the Netzarim Corridor, where an Israeli checkpoint used to stand.

An official from the Hamas-run interior ministry said "Israeli forces have dismantled their positions... and completely withdrawn their tanks from the Netzarim Corridor on Salaheddin Road, allowing vehicles to pass freely in both directions."

AFP journalists saw no troops in the area as cars, buses, pickup trucks and donkey carts travelled along the road from both the north and south.

Gaza resident Mahmoud al-Sarhi told AFP that for him, "arriving at the Netzarim Corridor meant death until this morning."

This is "the first time I saw our destroyed house," he said of his home in the nearby Zeitun area.

"The entire area is in ruins. I cannot live here."

According to a senior Hamas official, the Israeli withdrawal from Netzarim had been scheduled for yesterday under the terms of a truce that took effect on January 19.

Asked about yesterday's withdrawal, an Israeli security official told AFP on condition of anonymity: "We are preparing to implement the ceasefire agreement according to the guidelines of the political echelon."

The war in Gaza began with Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, and the ceasefire sealed in the lead-up to US President Donald Trump's inauguration has largely halted the fighting.

The health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip said Israeli offensive since then has killed at least 48,181 people.

Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israel and Hamas completed on Saturday their fifth round of hostage-prisoner exchange, with three Israeli hostages and 183 Palestinian prisoners released.

Netanyahu denounced Hamas as "monsters" after the handover of the three captives, who appeared emaciated and were forced to speak on a stage flanked by Hamas gunmen.

The hospital treating former hostages Or Levy and Eli Sharabi said they were in a "poor medical condition", while Ohad Ben Ami was in a "severe nutritional state".

Of the prisoners freed from Israeli jails, the Palestinian Prisoners' Club advocacy group said seven required hospitalisation, decrying "brutality" and mistreatment in jail.

Halfway around the world, in Bangkok, five Thai farm workers held hostage by Hamas and freed in an earlier swap wept with joy as they returned home yesterday.

"You are back, I thought you were dead," the grandfather of 33-year-old Watchara Sriaoun told him.

On Saturday, Netanyahu ordered negotiators to return to Qatar, which helped mediate the truce, "to discuss technical details of the agreement", his office said.

It added that on his return to Israel from the United States, where met Trump, Netanyahu will "hold a security cabinet meeting regarding negotiations for the second phase of the hostage release deal".

Senior Hamas official Bassem Naim on Saturday warned that Israel's "lack of commitment in implementing the first phase... exposes this agreement to danger and thus it may stop or collapse".

Earlier this week, Trump sparked global outrage by suggesting the United States should take control of the Gaza Strip and clear out its inhabitants.

The Israeli defence minister this week ordered the army to prepare for "voluntary" departures from Gaza.

Trump has ruled out sending American troops to the territory, and in an interview with Fox News aired on Saturday, Netanyahu said Israel was willing to "do the job".

With the region already on edge over Trump's proposed displacement of Palestinians, Netanyahu sparked fury when he told a television interview that a Palestinian state -- which the premier has long opposed -- could be "in Saudi Arabia".

The Saudi foreign ministry stressed its "categorical rejection to such statements", while Arab League chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit said such ideas "are nothing more than mere fantasies or illusions".

Egypt will host a summit of Arab nations on February 27 to discuss "the latest serious developments" concerning the Palestinian territories, its foreign ministry said yesterday.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty was heading to Washington for talks yesterday, while Jordan's King Abdullah II was due to meet Trump at the White House on February 11.