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(Bloomberg) — Israel halted its already limited supply of electricity to the Gaza Strip, a move the government called a response to the Hamas hostage crisis and which a liaison officer said would suspend production by a desalination plant in the war-wracked enclave.

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A six-week Gaza truce, involving limited swaps of hostages for hundreds of Palestinians jailed by Israel, expired on March 2, with the sides divided on conditions for an open-ended suspension of hostilities. 

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Israel has since halted the entry of humanitarian aid and commercial goods to Gaza, and said more measures would be in store as long as the Palestinian faction balks at its core terms. 

“We will avail ourselves of all means at our disposal to free the hostages and to ensure that Hamas will not be in Gaza on the day after,” Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen said in a video statement announcing the electricity cut-off on Sunday. 

A spokesperson for Cogat, the Israeli agency which coordinates on Palestinian civilian affairs, said the electricity supply affected was for a dedicated power line to desalination plant in Gaza, which would now stop functioning. 

The plant has accounted for a fraction of Gaza’s water, which mostly comes from wells. Palestinians’ other energy needs are supplied by emergency generators; a major power line from Israel was knocked out early in the war that erupted after Hamas carried out a shock cross-border attack on Oct. 7, 2023. 

Israel wants any long-term Gaza deal ending the war also to end Hamas’ rule and supply of weapons. The Palestinian Islamist group, which is on the terrorist blacklists of much of the West, has signaled willingness to cede power but not its rockets and rifles. 

Israel will on Monday send envoys to Qatar, which along with Egypt has been mediating the Gaza deals. Separately, the US has both overseeing that diplomacy while holding limited direct contacts with Hamas. 

The White House envoy involved in the US-Hamas talks, Adam Boehler, said on Sunday that a breakthrough could be possible within weeks.

“I believe there is enough there to make a deal between what Hamas wants and what they’ve accepted and what Israel wants and it’s accepted,” he told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

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