Qatar says Gaza truce not close, but hope remains; working on permanent ceasefire
Doha Foreign Ministry spokesperson says Israel, Hamas, not ‘converging;’ Hamas says Netanyahu is ‘stumbling block,’ refusing to meet terror group’s conditions
Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al-Ansari said Tuesday that while a hostage and ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is not close to being agreed upon, Doha remains hopeful.
Despite weeks of talks involving US, Qatari, and Egyptian mediators, the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began on Monday without the start of a widely sought truce and hostage exchange.
“We are not near a Gaza ceasefire deal but remain hopeful,” Ansari said at a press conference in Doha, adding that talks are ongoing.
“We are not seeing both sides converging on language that can resolve the current disagreement over the implementation of a deal,” he said.
All parties were “continuing to work in the negotiations to reach a deal hopefully within the confines of Ramadan,” Ansari said.
But he added that he cannot “offer any timeline” on a deal and explained that the situation remains “very complicated on the ground.”
Ansari also said that Qatar is working to establish a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, rather than a short-term truce of a few days.
War erupted on October 7 when the Palestinian terror group Hamas carried out a massive, devastating assault on Israel. The thousands of attackers who burst through the border from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel killed 1,200 people amid horrific atrocities and abducted 253 people who were taken as hostages to Gaza.
Israel responded with a military campaign to topple the Hamas regime in Gaza, destroy the terror group, and free the hostages, 130 of whom remain in captivity — not all of them alive.
Hamas official Mohammad Nazzal said that while negotiations for a potential hostage deal and temporary ceasefire are at an impasse, mediators are still working to try to advance an agreement.
“The negotiations have not stopped. It has reached an impasse in recent days, but Qatar and Egypt are working hard to continue it,” he told Al Jazeera, according to the Kan public broadcaster.
“Hamas responds to the mediators and is trying to cooperate positively, but [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu is a stumbling block to any understanding. The negotiations will not stop until Netanyahu meets Hamas’s conditions,” Nazzal said, without giving further details.
Israel has said any ceasefire must be temporary and that its goal remains the destruction of Hamas and the return of all hostages. The terror group says it will release the hostages it has been holding since October 7 only as part of a deal that ends the war.
The reported outline of a six-week truce deal, thus far rejected by Hamas, would see 40 children, women, elderly, and sick hostages released in the first phase, in exchange for some 400 Palestinian security prisoners, with the possibility of further releases to be negotiated.
Qatar helped negotiate a previous weeklong truce in November that saw 105 hostages released, mostly women and children, in exchange for three times as many Palestinian security prisoners held in Israeli jails. Humanitarian aid to Gaza was also boosted during the lull.
