As Egypt presses Israel for a response on the latest ceasefire proposal approved by Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instead announced on Wednesday that he was “shortening the timelines” for the IDF’s plans to conquer Gaza City, a day after Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer met with Qatari officials in Paris to discuss the negotiations.

While momentum has mounted over the past few days toward reaching a hostage release deal, Netanyahu has continued to dismiss such efforts, focusing instead of the plan approved by the cabinet earlier this month to intensify fighting in the Gaza Strip, though he has not outright rejected the latest proposal.

In a statement Wednesday evening, Netanyahu said he had instructed the army to “shorten the timelines for seizing the last terror strongholds and for the defeat of Hamas,” referring to the IDF’s upcoming offensive in Gaza City.

“The prime minister expresses his deep appreciation to the reserve fighters who were mobilized and to their families, and to all IDF soldiers,” his office added, after the IDF said Tuesday that 60,000 reservists were being called up ahead of the operation.

The IDF’s plans for the capture of Gaza City are set to be presented to Netanyahu on Thursday, according to military officials.

An unnamed senior Israeli official told Hebrew media outlets that Israel does not currently plan to dispatch a team to Qatar or Egypt to take part in the talks. Reports also suggested that Israel for the time being has decided to avoid responding at all to the phased hostage release deal proposal approved on Monday by Hamas.

But Dermer met on Tuesday in Paris with a delegation of senior Qatari officials to discuss the ongoing hostage release and ceasefire negotiations, an Arab diplomat told The Times of Israel.

During the meeting, Dermer reiterated the Israeli stance that it is only interested in a comprehensive deal in which Hamas releases all of the hostages at once and agrees to Jerusalem’s terms for its surrender from power, the Arab diplomat said, confirming a Channel 12 news report.

In a conversation with US special envoy Steve Witkoff on Wednesday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty stressed the importance of Israel responding to the Arab mediators’ ceasefire proposal accepted by Hamas on Monday, according to an Egyptian readout.

In his call with Witkoff, Abdelatty updated the US envoy on the latest developments in the ceasefire talks, stressing the need to “seize the current opportunity” to bring about an end to the war, the Egyptian readout said.

Hamas claimed this week that it has agreed to a deal based on the so-called “Witkoff framework,” which would commit the terror group to release 10 living hostages and the bodies of 18 of the slain hostages, in exchange for a 60-day ceasefire and the release by Israel of hundreds of Palestinian security prisoners, amid talks for a permanent end to the war.

On Wednesday, Hamas said Israel’s plans to conquer Gaza City showed its “blatant disregard” for the efforts to broker a ceasefire.

“Today’s announcement by the terrorist occupation army of the start of an operation against Gaza City and its nearly one million residents and displaced persons… demonstrates… a blatant disregard for the efforts made by the mediators,” the Palestinian terror group said in a statement.

“Netanyahu’s disregard for the mediators’ proposal … proves that he is the real obstructionist of any agreement,” it further charged, while saying Israel’s planned operation in Gaza City would fail.

Fifty hostages remain held captive in Gaza — 49 of the 251 taken hostage on October 7 and the body of a soldier who was killed in 2014. Israeli officials have declared that 28 of them are dead, while 20 are believed to be alive and there are grave concerns for the well-being of two others.

In the first ceasefire deal in November 2023, 105 hostages were freed by Hamas, and another 30 were released in another deal in January and February 2025 alongside the bodies of eight slain hostages which were returned to Israel. Five other hostages have been freed outside of these deals, while eight have been rescued by IDF troops and the bodies of 49 captives have been recovered from Gaza throughout the war.

Channel 12 news reported on Monday that a senior member of Israel’s negotiation team told the families that officials are seeking to leverage Hamas’s weakened position to reach a more comprehensive agreement, without giving up the possibility of securing the narrower deal Hamas has already accepted.

Pressed by a relative on whether such an outcome is realistic, the official replied that it “also depends on Hamas.”

When asked about the danger to the hostages amid Israel’s military operations in Gaza, the negotiator acknowledged the risks: “We are careful, but there is a risk to the hostages — [their safety] is not guaranteed,” he said, echoing the position reportedly taken by the IDF chief.

According to the TV network, Defense Minister Israel Katz supports moving ahead with conquering the rest of the Strip rather than agreeing to a partial deal, believing that “starting the ground operation and entering Gaza City will bring Hamas to agree to a comprehensive deal.”

Critics of Netanyahu, including the Hostages Families Forum, have accused him of making wartime decisions for political considerations, a charge he forcefully denies, and passing up past opportunities to reach a deal.

The proposal to forge a partial hostage release deal with Hamas has garnered significant opposition from the hard-right elements in Netanyahu’s coalition.

According to a Channel 12 report, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich told families of Israeli hostages that he would resign from the government if Netanyahu approves the deal.

“If the prime minister goes through with the deal, I will make difficult decisions and resign from the government. I told the prime minister that,” Smotrich reportedly said.

Following the deal which led to the January-March ceasefire in Gaza, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir did quit the coalition, later rejoining, while Smotrich ultimately backed down from his threat to do so, though he condemned the agreement.

Netanyahu’s coalition currently holds only 60 out of 120 seats in the Knesset, lacking a majority after the United Torah Judaism party quit last month, followed by far-right MK Avi Maoz. But without an organized effort in the Knesset to bring down the government, a new election will not be called.

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid has repeatedly offered Netanyahu a political safety net in order to secure a hostage release deal.

The Kan public broadcaster reported on Wednesday that Benny Gantz, the chairman of the centrist Blue and White-National Unity party, is considering rejoining Netanyahu’s government to shore up votes for such a deal.

“There are currently no contacts about joining the government, but if we understand that doing so will lead to the release of hostages then that is what we will do,” Blue and White-National Unity MK Alon Schuster later told Kan when asked about the report.

“What do you expect? That we will let the hostages die?” he added.

Gantz’s party joined Netanyahu’s right-wing government following the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, and he was one of three voting members of a newly formed war cabinet. But his party left the government in mid-2024 due to differences with the prime minister.

Gantz’s faction has undergone a string of defections and now controls seven seats in the Knesset while still coordinating with an eighth member who recently left the party. The party’s numbers would not replace the 13 MKs controlled by Smotrich and Ben Gvir, and would not give Netanyahu a majority in the 120-member body.

Agencies and Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.