Hamas's nod to draft deal for Gaza ceasefire and release of hostages: Report

The US, Egypt and Qatar have spent the past year trying to mediate an end to the 15-month war and secure the release of dozens of hostages captured in Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack that triggered it.

In Short

• Draft agreement includes hostage release, pause in fighting in Gaza
• Qatar says Israel and Hamas close to finalising deal
• If passed by Israeli cabinet, deal expected to ease Gaza's humanitarian crisis

Hamas has accepted a draft agreement for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and the release of dozens of hostages, two officials involved in the talks said on Tuesday. Mediator Qatar said Israel and the Palestinian terror group were at the “closest point” yet to sealing a deal.

The Associated Press obtained a copy of the proposed agreement, and an Egyptian official and a Hamas official confirmed its authenticity. An Israeli official said progress has been made, but the details are being finalised. The plan would need to be submitted to the Israeli Cabinet for final approval.

All three officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door talks.

The US, Egypt and Qatar have spent the past year trying to mediate an end to the 15-month war and secure the release of dozens of hostages captured in Hamas's October 7, 2023, attack that triggered it. Some 100 people are still captive inside Gaza, and the military believes at least a third of them are dead.

Any deal is expected to deliver a pause in fighting and bring Israel and Hamas a step closer to winding down the most deadly and destructive war they’ve ever fought, a conflict that has destabilised the broader Middle East and sparked worldwide protests.

It would bring relief to the hard-hit Gaza Strip, where Israel’s offensive has reduced large areas of the territory to rubble and displaced around 90 per cent of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million, many of whom are at risk of famine. Meanwhile, dozens of Israeli hostages would be reunited with their loved ones after months in captivity.

Officials have expressed optimism before, only for negotiations to grind to a halt. But they are now suggesting that they can conclude an agreement ahead of the January 20 inauguration of US President-elect Donald Trump, whose Mideast envoy has joined the negotiations.

Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said at a weekly briefing on Tuesday that the ongoing negotiations were productive, while declining to get into the details.

“Today, we are at the closest point ever to having a deal,” he said.

Hamas, meanwhile, said in a statement that the ongoing negotiations had reached their “final stage”.

In the October 7 attack, Hamas-led terrorists killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducted another 250. Around half those hostages were freed during a brief ceasefire in November 2023.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed over 46,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were combatants.

Israeli strikes across Gaza overnight and into Tuesday killed at least 18 Palestinians, including two women and four children, according to local health officials, who said one of the women was pregnant and that the baby died as well.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. Israel says it only targets militants and accuses them of hiding among civilians.

A THREE-PHASE AGREEMENT

The three-phase agreement — based on a framework laid out by US President Joe Biden and endorsed by the UN Security Council — would begin with the gradual release of 33 hostages over a six-week period, including women, children, older adults and wounded civilians in exchange for potentially hundreds of Palestinian women and children imprisoned by Israel.

Among the 33 would be five female Israeli soldiers, each of whom would be released in exchange for 50 Palestinian prisoners, including 30 convicted militants who are serving life sentences.

The Israeli official said Israel assumes most of the 33 are still alive.

During this first, 42-day phase, Israeli forces would withdraw from population centres, Palestinians would be allowed to start returning to their homes in northern Gaza and there would be a surge of humanitarian aid, with some 600 trucks entering each day.

Details of the second phase still must be negotiated during the first. Those details remain difficult to resolve — and the deal does not include written guarantees that the ceasefire will continue until a deal is reached. That leaves the potential for Israel to resume its military campaign after the first phase ends.

The Israeli official said “detailed negotiations” on the second phase will begin during the first. He said Israel will retain some “assets” throughout the negotiations, referring to a military presence, and would not leave the Gaza Strip until all the hostages are back home.

The three mediators have given Hamas verbal guarantees that negotiations will continue as planned and that they will press for a deal to implement the second and third phases before the end of the first, the Egyptian official said.

The deal would allow Israel throughout the first phase to remain in control of the Philadelphi corridor, the band of territory along Gaza’s border with Egypt, which Hamas had initially demanded Israel withdraw from. Israel would pull out from the Netzarim Corridor, a belt across central Gaza where it had sought a mechanism for searching Palestinians for arms when they return to the territory’s north.

In the second phase, Hamas would release the remaining living captives, mainly male soldiers, in exchange for more prisoners and the “complete withdrawal” of Israeli forces from Gaza, according to the draft agreement.

Hamas has said it will not free the remaining hostages without an end to the war and a complete Israeli withdrawal, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has in the past vowed to resume fighting until Hamas’s military and governing capabilities are eliminated.

Unless an alternative government for Gaza is worked out in those talks, it could leave Hamas in charge of the territory.

In a third phase, the bodies of remaining hostages would be returned in exchange for a three- to five-year reconstruction plan to be carried out in Gaza under international supervision.

GROWING PRESSURE AHEAD OF TRUMP'S INAUGURATION

Israel and Hamas have come under renewed pressure to halt the conflict in the lead-up to Trump’s inauguration next week. His Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, recently joined US, Egyptian and Qatari mediators in the Gulf country’s capital, Doha.

Trump said late on Monday that a ceasefire was “very close”.

“I understand there’s been a handshake and they are getting it finished -- and maybe by the end of the week,” he told the American cable channel Newsmax.

Hamas has blamed Israel for the repeated setbacks in the negotiations, saying that on more than one occasion, the terror group had accepted a proposal from mediators only to see Israel reject it or launch a new military operation immediately afterwards.

Israel and its close ally, the US, have blamed setbacks on Hamas.