Delegations from Hamas, Israel and the US were yesterday due to convene in Egypt for talks, with US President Donald Trump urging negotiators to “move fast” to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza.
Both Hamas and Israel have responded positively to Trump’s proposal for an end to the fighting and the release of captives in Gaza in exchange for Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
The indirect talks were due to begin on the eve of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, which sparked the war.
Photo: AFP
Trump’s plan envisages the disarmament of Hamas, which the militant group is unlikely to accept, as well as the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip.
Previous rounds of negotiations have also stalled over the names of Palestinian prisoners the Islamist group proposed for release.
Hamas’ lead negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, who was targeted with other leaders from the group in Israeli strikes in Doha last month, was to meet with mediators from Egypt and Qatar in Cairo yesterday morning, a senior official from the group said, ahead of talks in the Egyptian town of Sharm El-Sheikh.
Photo: AFP
Negotiations would look to “determine the date of a temporary truce,” the official said, as well as create conditions for a first phase of the plan, in which 47 hostages held in Gaza are to be released in return for hundreds of Palestinian detainees.
Posting on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, Trump praised “positive discussions with Hamas” and allies around the world, including Arab and Muslim nations.
“I am told that the first phase should be completed this week, and I am asking everyone to MOVE FAST,” he wrote.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi yesterday praised Trump’s plan, saying it offered “the right path to lasting peace and stability.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has expressed hope that the hostages could be released within days, said his government’s delegation would be departing for Egypt yesterday for the talks.
The White House said Trump had also sent two envoys to Egypt — his son-in-law Jared Kushner and Middle East negotiator Steve Witkoff.
Agence France-Presse footage yesterday showed several explosions in Gaza, with plumes of smoke rising over the skyline, even after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio urged Israel to stop bombing the territory.
“You can’t release hostages in the middle of strikes, so the strikes will have to stop,” Rubio told CBS.
A Palestinian source close to Hamas said it would halt its military operations in parallel with Israel stopping its bombardment and withdrawing its troops from Gaza City.
Gaza’s civil defense agency, a rescue force operating under Hamas authority, said Israeli attacks killed at least 20 people across the territory on Sunday, 13 of them in Gaza City.
Noting that the “operational situation has changed,” Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir on Sunday said that if the negotiations failed, the military would “return to fighting” in Gaza.
Hamas has insisted it should have a say in the territory’s future, although Trump’s roadmap stipulates that it and other factions “not have any role in the governance of Gaza.”
Under the proposal, administration of the territory would be taken up by a technocratic body overseen by a transitional authority headed by Trump himself.
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