Progress was reported Thursday in newly revealed talks between the United States and Palestinian terror group Hamas on reaching the second phase of the current ceasefire deal in Gaza, prompting Israel — which opposes moving on to that stage and favors extending the first phase — to say it had no knowledge of the development.

Senior US officials engaged in discussions Wednesday night with Hamas leaders as well as with mediators from Egypt and Qatar, the Reuters news agency reported, citing two Egyptian sources.

A source confirmed the existence of the talks to The Times of Israel on Wednesday. On Thursday, The New York Times cited an unnamed Israeli official as saying Jerusalem was not given advance notice about the direct US-Hamas talks, and that Israel heard about the talks through “other channels.”

The conversation focused on negotiations for the second phase of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, and signaled a departure from a decades-long US policy of not negotiating with Hamas, which Washington and many Western countries list as a terrorist organization.

The sources said that Trump’s hostage envoy Adam Boehler held talks with Hamas officials in Doha in recent weeks, during which the terror group insisted on maintaining the original phased ceasefire agreement. The second phase is meant to see the release of all remaining hostages held in Gaza in exchange for a permanent end to the war and a full Israeli withdrawal from the Strip. Jerusalem has indicated it is not interested in advancing to that phase and will not end the war without stronger assurances that all the hostages will be released and that Gaza won’t pose a threat after the war ends.

The sides agreed during the talks that the ceasefire should remain in place to allow time for mediators to resolve disagreements between Hamas and Israel, after Hamas rejected Israel’s proposal for an extension of the first phase.

Talks on Wednesday night between the Americans and the Egyptians included addressing the question of who would govern Gaza after the war and named specific individuals who could be involved in its management, said Reuters.

Cairo, according to the two Egyptian sources cited by Reuters, stressed the need to uphold the ceasefire agreement until the end of the war, saying this would facilitate the implementation of Cairo’s reconstruction plan for Gaza that was endorsed by Arab leaders at a summit on Tuesday.

The sources said Wednesday’s talks ended in a positive spirit, suggesting that the sides may soon move toward negotiating the second phase of the deal.

The Prime Minister’s Office indicated to The Times of Israel that it was unaware of the development.

“We do not know of progress in talks on phase two,” said a PMO official.

Hamas representatives charged on Thursday that threats by US President Donald Trump against the Palestinian terrorist organization were “encouraging” Israel to avoid negotiating the second phase of a ceasefire.

Trump’s comments would “complicate matters regarding the ceasefire agreement,” Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem told CNN, urging the president to pressure Jerusalem into agreeing to a second phase “as stipulated in the agreement.”

Hamas spokesperson Abdel-Latif al-Qanua told Reuters that the US president’s threats equal support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s attempts to avoid entering another ceasefire agreement.

“The best track to release the remaining Israeli [hostages] is by [Israel] going into the second phase and compelling it to adhere to the agreement signed under the sponsorship of mediators,” he said.

The comments by Hamas came in response to a new ultimatum issued on Wednesday by Trump, which demanded that the terror group immediately release all remaining hostages or be destroyed.

“‘Shalom Hamas’ means Hello and Goodbye – You can choose,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. “Release all of the hostages now — not later — and immediately return all of the dead bodies of the people you murdered, or it is OVER for you.

“This is your last warning! For the leadership, now is the time to leave Gaza, while you still have a chance.”

Trump’s post was uploaded shortly after he met with eight released hostages in the Oval Office, and amid an apparent impasse in negotiations between Israel and Hamas after the first phase of the fragile ceasefire ended Saturday.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio urged Hamas to take Trump’s threats seriously, telling Fox News: “People don’t realize the President meets with these people, he hears their stories; he’s outraged and rightfully so.

“He’s tired of watching these videos every weekend where hostages that are emaciated are released and bodies are turned over, and sometimes it’s the wrong bodies and there’s five here and three there and there’s games that are being played.  And he’s lost his patience with it.

“He doesn’t say these things and not mean it, as folks are finding out around the world. If he says he’s going to do something, he’ll do it. And so they’d better take that seriously.”

Trump has issued multiple ultimatums to Hamas over the past several months with limited success. Before his inauguration, he demanded Hamas release all of the hostages or there would be “all hell to pay.” The terror group did not release all of them, but did agree to a multi-phase ceasefire deal with Israel that secured the release of 33 hostages, in multiple batches, during the first stage.

Last month, after Hamas threatened not to release one batch of those hostages as scheduled, citing Israeli violations of the agreement, Trump issued another similar ultimatum demanding that all of them be released at noon the following Saturday. Hamas did not agree to release all of the hostages, but it did free the three it was scheduled to let go.

“I am sending Israel everything it needs to finish the job; not a single Hamas member will be safe if you don’t do as I say,” Trump warned in his fresh threat on Wednesday.

Trump has advanced over $11 billion in weapons sales to Israel since taking office, including a shipment of 2,000-pound bombs that the Biden administration withheld due to concerns they’d lead to civilian deaths in Gaza.

He noted in his post that he had just met with the former hostages, “whose lives you have destroyed… Only sick and twisted people keep bodies, and you are sick and twisted!”

“Also, to the People of Gaza: A beautiful future awaits, but not if you hold hostages. If you do, you are DEAD! Make a SMART decision. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW, OR THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY LATER,” Trump added.

Trump’s ultimatum came after several roller-coaster days for the hostage families.

As phase one of the deal ended on Saturday, Netanyahu’s office issued a statement announcing that it had accepted what it described as a proposal from Trump’s Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff to extend the ceasefire under terms that the sides had agreed to in January.

While Israel signed onto these terms, including a stipulation that the two sides would hold negotiations regarding the terms of phase two, Netanyahu has long insisted that he would not end the war before Hamas’s military and governing capabilities have been dismantled. Accordingly, he largely refused to hold negotiations regarding phase two.

The “Witkoff proposal” he unveiled on Saturday evening envisions the extension of the ceasefire through Ramadan and Passover, which ends on April 19. During this period, the remaining hostages would be released in two batches — one on the first day of the extension and the other at the end, pending agreements on a permanent ceasefire.

Hamas quickly rejected the proposal, insisting it was only prepared to release hostages under the original framework that the sides reached in January. Israel, in turn, has threatened to resume fighting and on Sunday announced that it was blocking all humanitarian aid from entering Gaza moving forward.

While an Arab diplomat told The Times of Israel that the proposal was actually “more of an Israeli offer,” the Trump administration quickly got behind it and issued a statement backing Israel’s stance in the hostage negotiations.

Terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 59 hostages, including 58 of the 251 abducted by Hamas-led terrorists on October 7, 2023.

They include the bodies of at least 35 confirmed dead by the IDF. Hamas has so far released 30 living hostages — 20 Israeli civilians, five soldiers, and five Thai nationals — and the bodies of eight slain Israeli captives during the ceasefire that began in January.

The terror group freed 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November 2023, and four hostages were released before that in the early weeks of the war.

Eight hostages have been rescued from captivity by troops alive, and the bodies of 41 have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the Israeli military as they tried to escape their captors, and the body of a soldier who was killed in 2014.

The body of another soldier killed in 2014, Lt. Hadar Goldin, is still being held by Hamas, and is counted among the 59 hostages.