Qatar says Gaza truce talks in 'final stages'

Key mediator Qatar said negotiations for a Gaza truce and hostage release deal were in their "final stages" on Tuesday, expressing hope an agreement could be reached "very soon".

Qatar, Egypt and the United States have intensified efforts to broker a ceasefire to enable the release of hostages taken during Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

Late on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went into a meeting with top security officials to discuss the deal, his office said.

"The ball is now in Hamas's court," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said earlier. "If Hamas accepts, the deal is ready to be concluded and implemented."

US President Joe Biden and his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said in a phone call on Tuesday that both sides needed to show "flexibility" to get a deal over the line, according to a statement from Sisi's office.

Biden had said the day before that an agreement was "on the brink" of being finalised, just ahead of the inauguration of his successor, Donald Trump.

Qatar foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari on Tuesday said the negotiations were in their "final stages".

"Certainly we are hopeful that this would lead very soon to an agreement," Ansari said, while adding that "until there is an announcement... we shouldn't be over-excited".

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar, meanwhile, said during a visit to Rome that there was a "true willingness from our side to reach an agreement".

Hamas's October 7 attack, the deadliest in Israel's history, resulted in the deaths of 1,210 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.

On that day, militants also took 251 people hostage, 94 of whom are still being held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

Israel's retaliatory campaign in Gaza has killed 46,645 people, a majority of them civilians, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, whose figures the UN considers reliable.

- 'Act now' -

Relatives of Israeli hostages and war-battered Palestinians in Gaza waited anxiously for the deal to be finalised.

"Time is of the essence," said Gil Dickmann, cousin of former hostage Carmel Gat, whose body was recovered from a Gaza tunnel in September.

"Hostages who are alive will end up dead. Hostages who are dead might be lost," Dickmann told AFP at a rally in Jerusalem. "We have to act now."

Umm Ibrahim Abu Sultan said from Khan Yunis in southern Gaza that she had "lost everything" in the war.

"I am anxiously awaiting the truce. I will cry for days on end," said the mother of five.

Israeli media and sources close to the talks 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.

Israeli media also reported Tuesday that under the proposed deal, Israel would be allowed to maintain a buffer zone inside Gaza during the implementation of the first phase.

Hamas said it hoped for a "clear and comprehensive agreement", adding it had informed other Palestinian factions of the "progress made".

Successive rounds of negotiations last year failed to end the deadliest war in Gaza's history.

On Tuesday, a far-right member of Netanyahu's government, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, said he opposed what he described as a "disastrous deal".

The day before, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, also a far-right cabinet member, had warned he too would oppose any agreement to stop the war.

Saar, however, said Tuesday he believed "that if we will achieve this hostage deal we will have a majority in this government that will support the agreement".

- 'Harsh and bloody' -

Among the sticking points in the 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 on Tuesday said 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".

Even as intense diplomatic efforts continued towards a truce deal, Israeli forces pounded targets across Gaza.

Gaza's civil defence agency said overnight air strikes and shelling killed at least 18 people across the territory.

"Last night was harsh and bloody," spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.

The Israeli military told AFP it had "conducted several strikes on Hamas terrorists".

The Palestinian health ministry in the occupied West Bank, meanwhile, said Tuesday that an Israeli air strike on the Jenin refugee camp killed six people, with the Israeli military confirming it carried out an attack in the area.

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