Hamas said on Wednesday it had exchanged a list of the names of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners to be released under a swap deal and that it was optimistic about talks in Egypt on US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza.
Negotiations are focused on the mechanisms to halt the conflict, withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the swap deal, the Palestinian group added.
The timing of the implementation of the first phase of President Donald Trump’s 20-point initiative has not been agreed so far during talks in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh, a Palestinian source close to the negotiations told Reuters.
Trump expressed optimism about progress towards a deal on Tuesday, the second anniversary of October 7.
A US team, including special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law who served as Middle East envoy during Trump’s first term, will take part in the talks over a plan that has come closest to silencing the guns.
But officials on all sides urged caution over the prospects for a rapid agreement. In any case, the exchange of lists marks the first important step between the two sides to end Israel’s devastating war.
Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s close confidant, was due to join the talks on Wednesday afternoon, according to an Israeli official.
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, a key mediator, and Turkish intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin will also take part in the ceasefire negotiations on Wednesday, according to Reuters.
Hamas wants a permanent, comprehensive ceasefire, a complete pull-out of Israeli forces and the immediate start of a comprehensive reconstruction process under the supervision of a Palestinian “national technocratic body”.
Israel, for its part, wants Hamas to disarm, which the group says is not possible until the creation of a free Palestinian state.
US officials suggest they want to initially focus talks on a halt to the fighting and the logistics of how the Israeli hostages in Gaza and Palestinian detainees in Israel would be freed.
In the absence of a ceasefire, Israel has pressed on with its offensive in Gaza, increasing its international isolation.
Global outrage has mounted against Israel’s assault, which has internally displaced nearly Gaza’s entire population and set off a starvation crisis.
Multiple rights experts, scholars and a UN inquiry say it amounts to genocide despite Israel’s categorisation of its actions as self-defence after the 2023 Hamas attack.
The Israeli military has killed more than 67,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, in Gaza since October 2023.
The relentless bombardment has rendered the enclave all but uninhabitable and has led to mass displacement, starvation and the proliferation of disease.
