Qatar Says Gaza Truce Deal In "Final Stages": What We Know So Far
Qatar, a central mediator, said negotiations on a Gaza Truce Deal and hostage release arrangement were in their "final stages" on Tuesday, and hoped they could be concluded "very soon".
Qatar Says Gaza Truce Deal In "Final Stages": What We Know So Far
Qatar, Egypt and the United States have intensified efforts to broker a Gaza ceasefire deal that would release hostages taken during Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went into a meeting with top security officials to make the deal late Tuesday, his office said.
"The ball is in Hamas’s court," the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken earlier said. "If Hamas accepts, the Israel Hamas truce deal is sealed and it will be enacted."
US President Joe Biden and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi vowed in a telephone call on Tuesday that both leaders would need to be "flexible" to secure a deal, according to Sisi's office. Biden had said earlier the day that a deal was "on the brink" of being signed, ahead of the inauguration of his successor Donald Trump.
On Tuesday, a spokesman for the Qatar foreign ministry, Majed al-Ansari, said the talks were in "final stages".
"Certainly we hope that it will soon lead to an agreement," Ansari said, but "until something is announced... we shouldn’t be excited".
The Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, in contrast, declared during a visit to Rome that there was "a real desire on our part to reach an agreement".
Hamas’s 7 October attack – Israel’s deadliest to date – killed 1,210 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count of official Israelis.
Militants also captured 251 civilians that day, 94 of whom remain trapped in Gaza, 34 of whom the Israeli army has declared dead.
Israeli reprisals in Gaza have killed 46,645 people, mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory, whose numbers the UN trusts.
