Netanyahu to deploy team to Doha for Gaza deal parley after talks with Trump aides

PM’s office says mid-level delegation will head to Qatar this week following Washington meetings with special envoy Steve Witkoff and national security adviser Mike Waltz

Supporters and relatives of Israeli hostages hold posters with pictures of captives reading "Don't leave me behind," in front of the prime minister's office in Jerusalem on February 3, 2025. (Menahem Kahana / AFP)
Supporters and relatives of Israeli hostages hold posters with pictures of captives reading "Don't leave me behind," in front of the prime minister's office in Jerusalem on February 3, 2025. (Menahem Kahana / AFP)

WASHINGTON — Israel will dispatch a delegation to Qatar later this week for negotiations on the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said early Tuesday following meetings with senior Trump administration officials in Washington.

The Gaza truce and plans for a second stage that would end the war and free remaining living hostages were expected to be a main topic of conversation when Netanyahu meets later Tuesday with US President Donald Trump, becoming the first foreign leader to visit the White House since the Republican returned to power last month.

Netanyahu and senior aides huddled Monday night with US special envoy Steve Witkoff and National Security Adviser Michael Waltz at the prime minister’s Blair House guest lodgings near the White House. He also met with Evangelical Christian leaders, including incoming ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee.

“Israel is preparing for the working-level delegation to leave for Doha at the end of this week in order to discuss technical details related to the continued implementation of the agreement,” the office said in a statement following the meeting with Witkoff and Waltz.

The PMO had indicated earlier that Netanyahu and Witkoff would discuss Israel’s stance regarding the ceasefire deal, after which Witkoff would speak to fellow mediators from Egypt and Qatar.

Under the initial ceasefire deal, talks on the second stage were set to have started from the 16th day of the truce, which was Monday.

The Hamas terror group has said it is ready to negotiate the second stage of the three-part ceasefire deal. Under the first stage, now in its third week, 33 hostages are slated to be released for nearly 2,000 Palestinian inmates, many of them hardened terror convicts. The second phase aims to secure the release of the remaining living hostages, with Israel withdrawing troops and ending the war.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (C) meets with US special envoy Steve Witkoff (3rd R) and National Security Adviser Michael Waltz (3rd L) , accompanied by Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer (2nd R), National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi (2nd L), Ambassador to the US Yechiel Leiter (R), and Chief of Staff Tzachi Braverman (L) and military secretary Roman Gofman (bottom C) in Washington on February 4, 2025 (Avi Ohayon/GPO)

Trump, who has claimed credit for sealing the ceasefire after 15 months of war and prides himself on his dealmaking ability, is expected to push Netanyahu to stick to the agreement during the meeting.

He is also expected to lean on Netanyahu to accept a deal to normalize relations with Saudi Arabia, something he tried to do in his first term.

Trump said Sunday that talks with Israel and other Middle Eastern countries were “progressing” — but then warned less than 24 hours later that there that were “no guarantees that the peace [in Gaza] is going to hold.”

Witkoff said, however, that the halt in hostilities was still in place and that he was “certainly hopeful” the truce would stick.

Netanyahu is facing heavy pressure from right-wing political allies within his cabinet to abandon the deal and resume the war to fully defeat Hamas, which has attempted to reassert its power in the Strip since fighting paused on January 19. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, head of the far-right Religious Zionism party, has threatened to quit the government and strip the prime minister of his Knesset majority.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich addresses the Knesset ahead of a vote on the state budget, December 16, 2024. (Chaim Goldberg FLASH90)

Netanyahu has said Israel is committed to victory over Hamas and the return of all hostages abducted in the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, terror attack that triggered the war.

Pressure from Trump — including a threat of “hell to pay” if no deal was clinched by January 20 — was seen as a key factor in getting the sides to ink the initial ceasefire deal last month.

On Monday, a spokesman for Qatar’s Foreign Ministry said Doha was counting on Trump to reprise his use of the bully pulpit to push talks along.

US President Donald Trump speaks as he signs an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House, Monday, Feb. 3, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

The tense situation around Gaza has become even more sensitive in recent weeks as Trump has repeatedly touted a plan to “clean out” Gaza, calling for its residents to move to neighboring countries such as Egypt or Jordan. Trump said the plan could be temporary or permanent, but the mass displacement of civilians from Gaza was strongly rejected by Cairo, Amman, the Palestinians and other regional players.

Before leaving for Washington, Netanyahu said Israel’s wars with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and its confrontations with Iran had “redrawn the map” in the Middle East.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to media outlets ahead of boarding a plane to Washington on February 2, 2025. (Avi Ohayon/GPO)

“But I believe that working closely with President Trump we can redraw it even further, and for the better,” he said.

The premier had initially been slated to leave Washington on Thursday, but announced Monday he would remain in Washington until Saturday night to fit in more meetings. He is slated to meet Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday along with a second Waltz meeting. On Thursday, he will travel to Capitol Hill for talks with Congressional leaders including Senate Majority Leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson.

On Monday afternoon, Netanyahu held a meeting with Evangelical leaders in the US, who have been credited with helping turn Trump into a staunch Israel supporter. The meeting included Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor who is set to replace Jack Lew as ambassador to Israel. Lew, appointed by former US president Joe Biden, stepped down on January 20.

In recent years, Evangelicals have forged close working relationships with political figures from Israel’s right wing and the settlement movement, many of whom are opposed to ending the fighting in Gaza. That could put them on a collision course with Trump, who has pledged to end wars in the Middle East.

There were no public meetings planned with US Jewish community leaders, many of whom have had a rockier relationship with Netanyahu.

The Gaza ceasefire deal has so far led to the release of 13 Israeli hostages held by terror groups in Gaza — five Thai nationals abducted in the same attack were also freed from Gaza in a separate deal — in exchange for some 600 security prisoners. Israel believes 79 hostages remain in Gaza, nearly half of whom are thought to be dead. The captives include scores kidnapped on October 7, 2023, and three others — including the body of a soldier — held by Hamas for over a decade.

Relatives of hostages still in Gaza and many other Israelis are impatient for their freedom.

“The suffering that the families are going through as this drags on is inhuman,” Nissan Kalderon, the brother of newly released hostage Ofer Kalderon, said Sunday.

A military helicopter with released hostage Gadi Mozes arrives at the Ichilov Medical center in Tel Aviv, January 30, 2025. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

During the October 7, 2023 attack, Palestinian terror group Hamas led thousands of terrorists to invade southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.

The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 46,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 20,000 combatants in battle as of January and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.

Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.

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