Delegations from Hamas, Israel and the United States are due to convene in Egypt for talks on Monday, with 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.
Hamas’s lead negotiator Khalil al-Hayya was to meet with mediators from Egypt and Qatar in Cairo Monday morning, a senior official from the Palestinian militant group told AFP, ahead of talks in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh.
Negotiations will look to “determine the date of a temporary truce”, the official said, as well as create conditions for a first phase of the peace 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, the US president 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,” Trump wrote.
Foreign ministers from several countries, including Egypt, said the talks were a “real opportunity” to achieve a sustainable ceasefire, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed hope that the hostages could be released within days.
– ‘Strikes will have to stop’ –
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday urged Israel to stop bombing Gaza ahead of the discussions in Egypt.
“You can’t release hostages in the middle of strikes, so the strikes will have to stop,” Rubio told CBS.
Netanyahu said the Israeli delegation would be departing for Egypt on Monday for the talks, due to start on the eve of the second anniversary of the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack that sparked the war.
The White House said Trump had also sent two envoys to Egypt — his son-in-law Jared Kushner and Middle East negotiator Steve Witkoff.
“During communications with mediators, Hamas insisted that it is essential for Israel to halt military operations across all areas of the Gaza Strip, cease all air, reconnaissance, and drone activity, and withdraw from inside Gaza City,” a Palestinian source close to Hamas said, adding the group would “also halt their military operations” in parallel.
Militants seized 251 hostages during their October 7, 2023 attack, 47 of whom are still in Gaza. Of those, the Israeli military says 25 are dead.
According to Trump’s plan, in return for the hostages, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from the Gaza Strip who were arrested during the war.
Noting that the “operational situation has changed”, Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir warned Sunday that if the negotiations failed, the military would “return to fighting” in Gaza.
Israel, meanwhile, has continued to carry out strikes.
AFPTV footage showed thick smoke billowing over the skyline of the coastal territory on Sunday.
– No role for Hamas –
Gaza’s civil defence 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.
On Sunday night and Monday morning, airstrikes were conducted in Khan Yunis and parts of Gaza City, while artillery shelling and gunfire from drones continued in areas east of Gaza City, the civil defence told AFP.
“There has been a noticeable decrease in the number of air strikes (since last night). The tanks and military vehicles have slightly pulled back,” said Muin Abu Rajab, 40, a resident of the city’s Al-Rimal neighbourhood.
Hamas has insisted it should have a say in the territory’s future, though Trump’s roadmap stipulates that it and other factions “not have any role in the governance of Gaza”.
The US plan, endorsed by Netanyahu, calls for a halt to hostilities, the release of hostages within 72 hours, a gradual Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and Hamas’s disarmament — something the group has described as a red line in the past.
Under the proposal, administration of the territory would be taken up by a technocratic body overseen by a post-war transitional authority headed by Trump himself.
“We hope Trump will pressure Netanyahu and force him to stop the war,” said Ahmad Barbakh, a resident of the Al-Mawasi area.
“We want the prisoner exchange deal to be completed quickly so that Israel has no excuse to continue the war.”
Hamas’s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 67,139 Palestinians, according to health ministry figures in the Hamas-run territory that the United Nations considers reliable.
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