The 42-day truce's first phase involves prisoner exchanges and hostage releases, but the future remains uncertain as both sides navigate challenges toward achieving a sustainable and lasting peace agreement.

Cairo, Egypt - A joint operations room has been established in Cairo to oversee the implementation of the Gaza Strip ceasefire agreement. The room, comprising representatives from Egypt, Palestine, Qatar, the United States, and Israel, aims to ensure collaborative efforts and consistent adherence to the agreement's provisions.A high-level Egyptian source...

The deal, brokered by the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar, includes Hamas releasing 33 hostages and Israel freeing hundreds of Palestinian captives, alongside a sixfold

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal last week, Netanyahu said, however, said he was not going to agree to end the war before they remove Hamas, adding Israel was "not going to leave them in power in Gaza, 30 miles from Tel Aviv."

Under US-brokered terms, Lebanon's army regains border control, curbing Hezbollah activity, while Israel vows to maintain security operations if threats persist post-ceasefire.

U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein announced "additional progress" in Lebanon-Israel ceasefire talks, heading to Israel to finalize an agreement amidst escalating clashes and a dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

The Gulf emirate, which has hosted Hamas's political leadership since 2012 with US blessing, has been involved in months of protracted diplomacy aimed at ending the 13-month old war that has killed 43,552 people in Gaza.

A US-brokered plan reportedly under consideration would see Hezbollah pull back 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the border, north of the Litani River, with Israeli forces withdrawing and the Lebanese army patrolling the border alongside UN peacekeepers.

With US mediation, a ceasefire proposal emerges for both Gaza and Lebanon, balancing Israel's security demands and Lebanon’s need for Hezbollah de-escalation and a potential truce with Hamas.

Israel’s security cabinet discussed terms, including Hezbollah’s withdrawal north of the Litani River and Lebanese army deployment along the border to facilitate a 60-day truce.

Israel’s Mossad chief will travel to Qatar for ceasefire negotiations as Hamas signals readiness to halt fighting, contingent on Israel agreeing to withdraw from Gaza, enable aid access, and facilitate the return of displaced people.

The head of Israel's Mossad spy agency, David Barnea, will head to Qatari capital Doha on Sunday, the Israeli prime minister's office said, to attend talks with US and Qatari officials. The apparent resumption of the long-stalled truce negotiations come with Israel under pressure to end its wars with Iran-backed...

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Israel to reach a ceasefire in Gaza, while Israeli airstrikes continued targeting Hezbollah's strongholds in Lebanon.

Jerusalem, Undefined - Frustrated with the dwindling prospect of reaching a ceasefire deal in the year-long Gaza war, some Israeli entrepreneurs have sought a different avenue to release hostages -- offering a financial reward for those who choose to free them.Former SodaStream CEO Daniel Birnbaum told AFP Monday he had received...

In a call with French President Emmanuel Macron, Netanyahu said he was "opposed to a unilateral ceasefire, which does not change the security situation in Lebanon, and which will only return it to the way it was", according to a statement from his office.

The vessel had departed from Iraq and was destined for a port near Athens, carrying 150,000 metric tons of crude oil, according to the European Union's Red Sea naval mission, Aspides. The EU naval force, formed in February to protect merchant vessels from attacks by the Houthis, warned last week...

Doha, Qatar - Top US diplomat Antony Blinken appealed Tuesday to Hamas urgently to accept a ceasefire plan to ease suffering in Gaza but also entered a public spat with Israel as he capped a new round of shuttle diplomacy.The US secretary of state closed his ninth wartime trip to the...

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told several Middle Eastern counterparts in recent days that "this ceasefire deal is of vital importance, that we need to do everything we can to get it done, and that escalation is in no one's interest", State Department spokesman Vedant Patel said on Wednesday.

Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for the civil defence agency, said 11 children and six women were among the 93 who died at the school shelter, "and there are many unidentified body parts". "They dropped a missile on them while they were just praying," said one woman, mourning over a dead child...

A prospective cessation of hostilities also involving the release of hostages held in Gaza and scaled-up aid deliveries has centred around a phased deal beginning with an initial truce. Recent discussions have focused on a framework outlined by US President Joe Biden in late May which he said had been...

Jerusalem, Undefined - Qatari and Egyptian mediators are cajoling Israel and Hamas towards negotiations on a plan to end their war, which has left tens of thousands dead.US President Joe Biden first outlined in late May what he called an Israeli initiative for a truce and hostage release deal. Mediators are now...

Hamas has accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of deliberately stepping up battles in Gaza City and far-southern Rafah to thwart a ceasefire agreement.

Large protests, also demanding elections, have taken place across Israel's commercial hub every Saturday night, with smaller ones throughout the country. On Saturday night, anti-government demonstrators blocked a highway in Tel Aviv. Some clashed with police on horseback before officers deployed water canon to force people from the road.

Jerusalem, Undefined - Israel said Friday that "gaps" remained with Hamas on how to secure a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release but that it will send a delegation for fresh talks with Qatari mediators next week.The statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's spokesman came after a delegation led by the head...

A Hamas official in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, confirmed that the Islamist movement had received the latest proposal but said it presented "no real progress in the negotiations". Hamas has called for a permanent ceasefire and full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, demands repeatedly rejected by Israel.

On Monday, the UN Security Council adopted a US-drafted resolution supporting the plan, and on Thursday, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said G7 leaders "call on Hamas in particular to give the necessary consent". Some Gazans have also called on Hamas to do more to secure an agreement

Doha, Qatar - Top US diplomat Antony Blinken said Wednesday that a truce and hostage release deal to end the Gaza war was still possible, wrapping up a Middle East tour as deadly fighting rocked the Palestinian territory.Lebanon's Iran-backed group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, rained rockets on northern Israel, a day...

Qatar, with the United States and Egypt, has been engaged in months of negotiations over details for a ceasefire in Gaza. But except for a seven-day break in hostilities beginning in November that led to the release of more than 100 hostages, the mediation efforts have not stopped the fighting.

Hamas had told mediators it "cannot agree to a deal that doesn't that does not secure... a permanent ceasefire and the complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and the achievement of a serious, real captive exchange deal", he said.

Palestinian Territories - Israel launched devastating air strikes on Gaza Thursday, while also expressing readiness to resume stalled talks on a truce and hostage release deal with Hamas to pause the war raging since October 7.The Gaza Strip's civil defence agency said two pre-dawn air strikes had killed 26 people,...

"There is no clarity how to stop the war from the Israeli side. I don't think that they are considering this as an option... even when we are talking about the deal and leading to a potential ceasefire," Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani told the Qatar Economic Forum.

"The negotiating delegation left Cairo heading to Doha. In practice, the occupation (Israel) rejected the proposal submitted by the mediators and raised objections to it on several central issues," Hamas said in a message to other Palestinian factions, adding it stood by the proposal.

The hawkish prime minister has insisted he will send ground troops into Rafah, despite strong concerns voiced by UN agencies and ally Washington for the safety of the 1.2 million civilians inside the city. A top Hamas official accused Netanyahu on Friday of trying to derail a proposed Gaza truce...

A Hamas official said the group would respond "within a very short period" to a plan proposed by mediators to halt the fighting for 40 days and to exchange dozens of hostages for many more Palestinian captives. But the group's aim remains an "end to this war", senior Hamas official...

Jerusalem, Undefined - Hopes rose on Monday for a long-sought-after truce and hostage release deal after almost seven months of war in Gaza between Palestinian Hamas fighters and Israel.Washington's top diplomat said he was "hopeful" Hamas would accept the offer, which his British counterpart said could see the release of thousands...

Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been trying to mediate a new truce ever since a one-week halt to the fighting in November saw 80 Israeli hostages exchanged for 240 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. Protesters within Israel are demanding that the government secure freedom for other hostages.

The strike came as talks in Cairo aimed at a ceasefire and a hostage release deal dragged on without signs of a breakthrough. Speaking to Al Jazeera, Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, suggested the strike was an attempt to shift Hamas's negotiating stance, but insisted it would not work.

After talks in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Blinken flies to Israel on Friday, his sixth trip to the region since the war began with Hamas's attack on Israel on October 7. Israel said its spy chief would also head back to Qatar on Friday for more truce talks with US,...

The Israeli prime minister's office said that Benjamin Netanyahu approved an Israeli delegation led by Mossad head David Barnea to go to Qatar" on Friday. Barnea was in Doha Monday but flew back home after talks were restarted following failed efforts to secure a truce before the holy month of...

Jerusalem--Israel's security cabinet is set to meet Sunday to discuss the "mandate" of a delegation due to travel to Doha for talks on a truce in Gaza, the prime minister's office said.The security cabinet and the smaller, five-member war cabinet will meet Sunday to "decide on the mandate of the...

"We are not near a deal, meaning that we are not seeing both sides converging on language that can resolve the current disagreement over the implementation of a deal," said foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari. He added that he could not "offer any timeline" on an agreement.

Palestinian Territories - A Hamas delegation was expected to fly to Cairo on Saturday for talks on a truce in Gaza, a source close to the group told AFP, as mediators scrambled to secure a deal.Egyptian, Qatari and US go-betweens have been shuttling between Israeli and Hamas negotiators, trying to...

The latest overall toll for Palestinians killed in the war came after at least 79 people died overnight across the war-torn Gaza Strip, the health ministry said Thursday. Meanwhile, negotiators are hoping a truce can begin by the start of Ramadan, the holy Muslim month that kicks off March 10...

Netanyahu has faced increasing public pressure over the fate of the remaining hostages. Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel's far-right national security minister, said Netanyahu should not accept Hamas's "delusional requests" in negotiations, adding that "the war must continue", according to news website Ynet.

Negotiations have been underway to strike a possible deal for Hamas to release hostages and pause the fighting in the Gaza Strip. But on the border with Lebanon there have been near-daily cross-border exchanges of fire between Israel and Hizbollah, sparking off fears of a wider regional escalation.

Mediator Qatar acknowledged that separate ceasefire talks had also hit an impasse after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected some Hamas demands as "ludicrous". Israel has concentrated its military operations in Khan Yunis, the hometown of Hamas's Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, whom it accuses of masterminding the October 7 attack.

CIA Director William Burns had joined Tuesday's talks with David Barnea, head of Israel's Mossad intelligence service, which Egyptian media said had been mostly "positive". US National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby described the negotiations as "constructive and moving in the right direction".

In Beirut, a senior Hamas official responded, saying Netanyahu's "insistence on continuing the aggression totally confirms that the goal... is genocide against the Palestinian people". The official, Osama Hamdan, urged "all resistance factions... to continue the fight" and to be cautious of Israeli "treachery during the final quarter-hour of this...

Last week, a Hamas source said the truce deal calls for a six-week pause to fighting as Hamas frees hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel and more aid for Gaza. On Monday, Netanyahu said Hamas had presented "demands that we will not accept" for an exchange involving...

Hamas has for more than a week mulled the deal drawn up in its absence at Paris talks, as international pressure mounts to end the four-month war. Hamas said the proposal was aimed at "ending the aggression against our people, securing relief and shelter, reconstruction, lifting the siege on the...