Negotiators will meet in Doha on Tuesday to finalize details of a plan to end the war in Gaza, after US President Joe Biden declared a ceasefire and release agreement hostages he defended was on the verge of success.
Mediators handed Israel and Hamas a final draft of the deal on Monday, an official briefed on the negotiations said, after a midnight “breakthrough” in talks attended by envoys from the outgoing US president and President-elect Donald Trump .
If successful, the ceasefire agreement would end more than a year of seesaw negotiations and lead to the largest release of Israeli hostages since the early days of the conflict, when Hamas released nearly half of its prisoners in exchange for 240 Palestinian detainees held by Israel.
The official briefed on the talks, who did not wish to be identified, said the text relating to the ceasefire and the release of the hostages had been presented by Qatar to both sides during talks in Doha, which included the heads of the Israeli spy agencies Mossad and Shin Bet, as well as the prime minister of Qatar.
Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s Middle East envoy, and Brett McGurk, Mr. Biden’s envoy, are expected to again participate in Tuesday’s talks in Doha, with Hamas negotiators nearby for rapid consultations in a bid to reach a rapid agreement.
Representatives from both parties and the United States reported progress. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the two sides were “closer than ever” to an agreement and that the ball was in Hamas’s court. Hamas has said it is keen to reach an agreement.
“The agreement… would free the hostages, end the fighting, ensure Israel’s security and allow us to significantly increase humanitarian aid to the Palestinians who have suffered terribly from this war started by Hamas,” Mr. Biden said in a speech Monday to highlight his foreign policy achievements.
An Israeli official said negotiations were at an advanced stage for the release of 33 hostages as part of the deal. Ninety-eight hostages are still in Gaza, according to Israeli authorities.
The Hamas delegation in Doha issued a statement Monday after a meeting with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani, saying the talks were progressing well.
Israel launched its assault on Gaza after Hamas fighters crossed its borders in October 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli counts.
Since then, more than 46,000 people have been killed in Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities, and much of the enclave has been destroyed and most of its population displaced.
For months, the belligerents have agreed on the principle of stopping the fighting in exchange for the release of hostages held by Hamas and Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. But Hamas has always insisted that a deal must lead to a definitive end to the war and Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, while Israel has said it will not end the war until Hamas does would not have been dismantled.
TRUMP INAUGURATION SEEN AS A DEADLINE
The United States, Qatar and Egypt have been working on talks aimed at ending the war for more than a year.
Mr. Trump’s inauguration on January 20 is now widely seen as a de facto deadline. Mr Trump said there would be “hell to pay” if hostages held by Hamas were not released before he took office, while Mr Biden also insisted a deal must be reached before his departure.
Mr Blinken said negotiators wanted to ensure Mr Trump would continue to support the deal on the table and so Mr Witkoff’s participation was “crucial”.
-Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told reporters Monday that negotiations were at a “hinge” point, with gaps between the two sides slowly narrowing. “I think there’s a good chance we can get this deal done […] the parties are close to being able to conclude this agreement,” he said.
A Hamas official told Reuters that progress had been made on some key issues “and we are working to quickly conclude what remains to be done.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar told reporters: Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar told reporters: “There is progress, and the situation seems much better than before. I want to thank our American friends for the considerable efforts they are investing in reaching a hostage agreement.”
In Cairo, an Egyptian security official told Reuters that the draft sent to the two warring sides did not include the final agreement but was “aimed at resolving outstanding issues that had hampered previous negotiations.”
ISRAELI OFFICIAL OUTLINES AGREEMENT DETAILS
An Israeli official who briefed reporters on the proposed deal said the first step would be to release 33 hostages, including children, women, including female soldiers, men over 50, as well as wounded and sick people.
On the 16th day after the agreement came into force, negotiations would begin for a second stage in which the remaining living hostages – soldiers and men of military age – would be released and the bodies of the deceased hostages returned.
The agreement provides for a gradual withdrawal of troops, with Israeli forces remaining in the border perimeter to defend Israeli border towns and villages. Additionally, security arrangements would be made in the Philadelphia Corridor along Gaza’s southern border, with Israel withdrawing from parts of that corridor after the first days of the deal.
Unarmed residents of the northern Gaza Strip would be allowed to return, with a mechanism put in place to ensure that no weapons are moved into that area. Israeli troops will withdraw from the Netzarim corridor in the center of the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli official said Palestinian militants convicted of killings or deadly attacks would also be released, but their number would depend on the number of living hostages, which is not yet known, and would not include the fighters who participated in the October 7, 2023 attack against Israel.
Israeli channel 12 said Israeli government institutions had been ordered to prepare to accommodate weak and sick hostages.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and his Religious Zionism party, a hardline nationalist party that has opposed previous attempts at a deal, have said all of their members would oppose a deal that fails. to the “destruction” of Hamas and that the latest proposal jeopardized Israel’s national security.
Bloodshed continued in Gaza on Monday. Residents reported a series of explosions in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, which targeted homes and roads. Palestinian health authorities said at least 40 Palestinians were killed and dozens more injured in Israeli military strikes in the Gaza Strip on Monday.
The Israeli army said five soldiers were killed in fighting in the northern Gaza Strip, bringing the number of its troops killed since Saturday to nine.
(Reporting by Andrew Mills in Doha, Nidal Al Mughrabi in Cairo; additional reporting by James Mackenzie, Maayan Lubell, Emily Rose in Jerusalem, Ahmed Mohamed Hassan in Cairo, Andrea Shalal, Trevor Hunnicutt, Susan Heavey and David Brunnstrom, Andrea Shalal, Simon Lewis and Daphne Psaledakis in Washington Editing: David Brunnstrom, Andrew Mills, Michael Georgy and William Maclean; Gareth Jones, Peter Graff, Nia Williams and Don Durfee)
