DOHA (AFP) – Mediators made a final push yesterday to seal a Gaza truce and hostage release deal, after a Qatari official involved in the talks expressed hope an agreement could be reached “very soon”.
Qatar, Egypt and the United States (US) have intensified efforts to broker a ceasefire and enable the release of hostages taken during Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack.
US President Joe Biden and his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said in a phone call on Tuesday that both Israel and Hamas needed to show flexibility to get a deal over the line, according to a statement from Sisi’s office.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went into a meeting with top security officials on Tuesday to discuss the deal, his office said, while US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the “ball is now in Hamas’s court”.
“If Hamas accepts, the deal is ready to be concluded and implemented,” said Blinken.
An Israeli source familiar with negotiations said that talks were continuing in Doha.
Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said on Tuesday that negotiations were in their “final stages” and mediators were hopeful they would lead “very soon to an agreement”.
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said there was a “true willingness from our side to reach an agreement”.
After months of failed efforts to end Gaza’s deadliest-ever war, the latest progress comes days ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration as US president.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign in Gaza has killed 46,645 people, most of them civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s Health Ministry, figures the United Nations (UN) considers reliable.
Relatives of Israeli hostages and war-weary Palestinians in Gaza were anxious for the deal to be finalised.
“Time is of the essence,” said Gil Dickmann, cousin of former hostage Carmel Gat, whose body was recovered in September.
“Hostages who are alive will end up dead. Hostages who are dead might be lost,” Dickmann told AFP. “We have to act now.”
Umm Ibrahim Abu Sultan, a resident of Gaza City now living in Khan Yunis after being displaced, said that she had “lost everything” in the war. “I am anxiously awaiting the truce,” said the mother of five.
Israeli government spokesman David Mencer said the first phase of a deal would see 33 Israeli hostages freed, while two Palestinian sources close to Hamas told AFP that Israel would release about 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in exchange.
“Israel is prepared to pay a heavy price – in the hundreds,” said Mencer.
A source close to Hamas said the “first stage of the agreement stipulates the release of 33 Israeli hostages in batches, starting with children and women”.
Negotiations for a second phase would commence on the truce’s 16th day, an Israeli official said.
That phase would see the release of the remaining captives, including “male soldiers, men of military age, and the bodies of slain hostages”, the Times of Israel reported.
Under the proposed deal, Israel would maintain a buffer zone inside Gaza during the first phase, according to Israeli media.
Hamas said it hoped for a “clear and comprehensive agreement”, adding it had informed other Palestinian factions of the “progress made”.
An official from militants have fought alongside Hamas in Gaza said a delegation had reached Qatar yesterday to join the discussions.
Among the sticking points in talks have been disagreements over the permanence of any ceasefire, the scale of humanitarian aid for the Palestinian territory and the withdrawal of Israeli troops.
Netanyahu has firmly rejected a full withdrawal from Gaza and has opposed any Palestinian governance of the territory.
But Blinken said on Tuesday Israel would ultimately “have to accept reuniting Gaza and the West Bank under the leadership of a reformed” Palestinian Authority, and embrace a “path toward forming an independent Palestinian state”.
He said a normalisation deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, which he negotiated but did not complete, remained the “best incentive” to achieve Israeli-Palestinian peace.
