US special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff is expected to travel to Doha this week amid efforts to extend the ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas, Axios said Saturday, with reports coming of progress in negotiations.
Meanwhile, an Israel official told the Kan public broadcaster on Sunday that some advancement toward the continuation of the deal had been made during a meeting between US hostage envoy Adam Boehler and a senior Hamas delegation led by Khalil al-Hayya last week.
Several meetings had taken place between leaders of Hamas and Boehler, Taher Al-Nono, the political adviser of the Hamas chief, confirmed to Reuters on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Israel has announced that a negotiating team will depart for Qatar on Monday at “the invitation of the mediators backed by the US.”
According to Axios, the Trump administration hopes to extend the first phase of the previously agreed-upon hostage deal, which ended last Saturday, through the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and until the end of the Jewish holiday of Passover on April 19. The report cited two US officials familiar with the matter.
Kan news on Saturday cited a senior Israeli source as confirming a Sky News Arabia report from last week that the US was offering Hamas a deal in which 10 living Israeli hostages would be released in exchange for a 60-day ceasefire. Hours later, the Saudi Al Hadath network reported that Hamas had agreed to the principle of releasing some living hostages in exchange for a two-month extension to the first phase of the ceasefire in Gaza.
The reported proposals appear to be in line with a plan that Israel has endorsed, but which the terror group had so far rejected in favor of pursuing the terms of a potential second phase of the deal, which would require Israel to withdraw fully from Gaza and agree to a permanent end to the war in exchange for the remaining living hostages. Israel has sought to extend the first phase to enable further hostage releases without committing to an end to the war.
Israel has avoided publicly criticizing the Trump administration over its unprecedented direct talks with Hamas, but Netanyahu’s office issued a terse statement on Wednesday that more than hinted at its opposition. “Israel has expressed to the United States its position regarding direct talks with Hamas,” the statement read.
Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer “lashed out” at Boehler Tuesday in a phone call for conducting a meeting over the number of Palestinian prisoners Israel would release in exchange for the five Israeli-American hostages still in Gaza, one of them alive and four believed dead, without Netanyahu’s consent, a Western official told The Times of Israel Friday.
Israel is “barely involved” and the talks with Hamas are occurring “over Israel’s head,” Kan reported Saturday.
On Sunday, Netanyahu will convene his cabinet, and later his security cabinet, to discuss the path forward, as 59 hostages remain in Gaza, up to 24 of them still alive.
The Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that Israel has plans for an escalatory campaign against Hamas if Netanyahu eventually decides that hostage talks with Hamas are fruitless or that the terror groups’ demands are too high.
The report pointed at Israel possibly cutting off electricity and water as a next stage, after it halted aid shipments into the Strip.
Citing an “Israeli security analyst briefed on the plan,” the WSJ said that Israel could use airstrikes and raids. The analyst added that the following stage could be military forces once again pushing Palestinians out of northern Gaza.
The 59 hostages held by terror groups in Gaza include 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 hostages — 20 Israeli civilians, five soldiers, and five Thai nationals — and the bodies of eight slain Israeli captives during a 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.
Lazar Berman and Jacob Magid contributed to this report.