Egypt sends delegation to Israel to try again to broker ceasefire
Egypt sent a high-level delegation to Israel for talks Friday seeking to push through a ceasefire agreement with Hamas and avert an Israeli offensive on Gaza’s town of Rafah — on the border with Egypt — which it warned could ruin regional stability, officials said.
Egypt’s top intelligence official, Abbas Kamel, led the delegation and planned to discuss with Israel a “new vision” for a prolonged ceasefire in Gaza, an Egyptian official said.
As the war drags on and casualties mount, there has been growing international pressure for Hamas and Israel to reach an agreement on a ceasefire.
Friday’s talks focused at first on a limited exchange of hostages held by Hamas for Palestinian prisoners, and the return of a significant number of displaced Palestinians to their homes in northern Gaza “with minimum restrictions,” the Egyptian official said.
The official said mediators are working on a compromise that will answer most of both parties’ main demands, then lead to continued negotiations with the goal of a larger deal to end the war.
A western diplomat in Cairo said Egypt’s intensified efforts for a ceasefire aim to avert a Rafah offensive.
Hamas has said it will not back down from its demands for a permanent ceasefire and full withdrawal of Israeli troops, both of which Israel has rejected.
And Israel says it will continue military operations until Hamas is defeated and that it will retain a security presence in Gaza afterwards.
In a statement Friday, Hamas said it is open to any “ideas or suggestions” that take into consideration the needs of the Palestinian people such as an end to Israel’s attacks on the Gaza Strip, the return of displaced people to their homes and an Israeli withdrawal.
Both Israeli and Egyptian officials confirmed the Egyptian delegation had arrived in Tel Aviv. Later, the Egyptian official said meetings had concluded and there was an agreement to work out a draft deal.
Overnight, Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group fired anti-tank missiles and artillery shells at an Israeli military convoy in a disputed border area, killing an Israeli civilian.
Hezbollah said its fighters ambushed the convoy shortly before midnight Thursday, destroying two vehicles.
The Israeli military said the ambush wounded an Israeli civilian doing infrastructure work, and that he later died of his wounds.
Low-intensity fighting along the Israel-Lebanon border has repeatedly threatened to boil over as Israel has targeted senior Hezbollah militants in recent months.
Tens of thousands of people have been displaced on both sides of the border. On the Israeli side, the cross-border fighting has killed 10 civilians and 12 soldiers, while in Lebanon, more than 350 people have been killed, including 50 civilians and 271 Hezbollah members.