Paris:
Talks on a ceasefire in Gaza were underway in Paris on Friday, in what appears to be the most serious attempt in weeks to stop fighting in the battered Palestinian enclave and free Israeli and foreign hostages.
A source briefed on the ceasefire negotiations who could not be identified by name or nationality said the talks had started with a separate meeting of Israel's Mossad intelligence chief with each side: Qatar, Egypt and the United States.
“There are emerging signs of optimism about the possibility of moving further towards the start of serious negotiations,” the source said. Egypt's Al Qahera TV News also reported that talks had begun.
A Hamas official said the group had concluded ceasefire negotiations in Cairo and was now waiting to see what mediators bring back from the weekend talks with Israel.
Mediators have stepped up efforts to broker a ceasefire in Gaza, hoping to prevent an Israeli attack on the Gaza city of Rafah, where more than a million displaced people are sheltering on the southern edge of the enclave.
Israel says it will attack the city if a ceasefire is not reached soon. Washington has called on its closest ally not to do so, warning of major civilian casualties if an attack on the city goes ahead.
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh met Egyptian mediators in Cairo last week to discuss a ceasefire in his first visit since December. Israel is now expected to take part in talks with American, Egyptian and Qatari mediators in Paris this weekend.
Two Egyptian security sources confirmed that Egypt's intelligence chief Abbas Kamel would go to Paris for talks with the Israelis on Friday after concluding talks with Hamas chief Haniyeh on Thursday. Israel has not commented publicly on the Paris talks.
The Hamas official, who asked not to be identified, said the group did not make any new proposal during the talks with the Egyptians but was waiting to see what the mediators took away from their upcoming talks with the Israelis.
“We have discussed our proposal with them (the Egyptians) and we are going to wait for them to return from Paris,” the Hamas official said.
The last time similar talks were held in Paris in early February, an outline was drawn up for the war's first extended ceasefire, agreed to by Israel and the United States. Hamas responded with a counterproposal, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu subsequently dismissed as “delusional.”
Hamas, believed to still be holding more than 100 hostages captured during the October 7 attack on Israel that sparked the war, says it will only free them as part of a ceasefire that ends with an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Israel says it will not withdraw until Hamas is eradicated.
Late Thursday, Netanyahu presented his security cabinet with an official plan for Gaza once the fighting stops. He emphasized that Israel expects to maintain security control over the enclave after the destruction of Hamas, and does not see a role for the Palestinian Authority (PA), based in the West Bank, in this regard.
Washington favors a role for a reformed PA.
Two Palestinian officials familiar with the negotiations said Hamas has not changed its position in the latest attempt to reach an agreement, still demanding that a ceasefire end with an Israeli withdrawal.
Rafah under fire
Israeli planes and tanks bombed areas in the Gaza Strip overnight, residents and health officials said. The Health Ministry in Gaza said 104 people were killed and 160 others injured in Israeli military strikes in the past 24 hours.
The Israeli army said it has killed dozens of fighters and seized weapons across Gaza since Thursday.
In Rafah, where more than half of Gaza's 2.3 million residents are sheltering, an Israeli airstrike on a house killed ten people.
At a mortuary in Rafah, a family knelt by the body of their child, killed by Israeli strikes. They tenderly touched the little body and caressed it through a shroud.
Airstrikes also killed civilians overnight in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, one of the few other areas yet to be stormed by the Israelis. In a video obtained by Reuters, relatives crowded a hospital, where Ahmed Azzam held up the body of his dead son wrapped in a shroud and shouted: “You killed them Netanyahu. You killed this innocent child!”
Israel says it is doing its best to minimize harm to civilians in the fight against Hamas in urban areas.
At least 29,514 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7, Gaza's Health Ministry said on Friday.
Israel launched its months-long military campaign after fighters from Hamas-ruled Gaza killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in southern Israel on October 7.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)