Truce negotiations between Hamas delegates and Egyptian, Qatari and U.S. mediators ended Saturday without reaching a cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
The mediators are proposing a 40-day cease-fire during which Hamas would start releasing female civilian hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Hamas has asked for a complete end to the war and the withdrawal of all Israeli forces from Gaza. Israel has vowed to crush Hamas and has said it will not agree to end the war as part of a hostage release deal, nor has it taken its intended Rafah invasion off the negotiating table.
After the talks began, a top Israeli official accused Hamas of "thwarting the possibility of reaching an agreement" by refusing to give up its demand for an end to the war. Israel has not sent a delegation to Cairo.
Shortly before 9 p.m. local time (1800 GMT), a senior Hamas source close to the negotiations told Agence France-Presse that the talks would resume on Sunday.
Earlier Saturday, Egyptian state media reported that "noticeable progress" had been made during the negotiations.
CIA Director William Burns arrived in Cairo Friday as part of Washington's diplomatic effort. The CIA has declined to comment on Burns' itinerary.
Earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described Israel's truce offer as "extraordinarily generous," and he urged Hamas to accept it.
It remains unclear if Hamas will accept the terms of the negotiators and whether Israel will back off its plan to end its all-out war aimed at destroying Hamas, which has been designated as a terror group by the U.S., the U.K. and other Western countries.
Israel has repeatedly warned it is planning to launch an assault against Hamas cells in the southern Gaza city of Rafah where about 1 million displaced people are crowded together, having fled months of Israeli attacks on the enclave.
"It could be a slaughter of civilians and an incredible blow to the humanitarian operation in the entire strip because it is run primarily out of Rafah," said Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the United Nations humanitarian office, or OCHA, at a Geneva news briefing.
Among the aid operations in Rafah are medical clinics, warehouses stocked with humanitarian supplies, food distribution points, and 50 centers for acutely malnourished children, Laerke said.
Israel has promised to ensure the safe evacuation of civilians from Gaza's border city with Egypt.
A World Health Organization official said at the same briefing that a plan for Rafah had been prepared, and it included a new field hospital. He underscored however, it would not be enough to prevent a significant increase in the death toll in the event of an assault.
Dr. Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the occupied Palestinian territory, said via video link that he was "extremely concerned" that any incursion would close the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, a corridor currently being used to import medical supplies.
In the last 24 hours, the bodies of 32 people killed by Israeli strikes have been brought to local hospitals, Gaza's Health Ministry said Saturday.
Palestinians remove the body of a man after a military operation in the Palestinians town of Deir al-Ghusun, near the West Bank town of Tulkarem, May 4, 2024.
The Israeli military says it has killed 13,000 militants, without providing evidence to support its claim. It also has conducted mass arrests during its raids inside Gaza.
Nearly 500 medical workers have been killed since October 7, according to a Gaza Health Ministry statement.
The World Health Organization and other medical groups have called for hospitals and medical workers to be off limits in Israel's war on Hamas. However, Israel says Hamas uses the medical facilities for military purposes, making them legitimate targets.
At least 34,622 Palestinians have been killed and 77,867 have been injured during Israel's military offensive against Hamas since the beginning of the war, the Gaza Health Ministry said in a statement Friday.
The ministry does not distinguish between fighters and civilians in its tallies but says that women and children make up around two-thirds of those killed.
Israel's counteroffensive on Gaza was triggered by Hamas' October 7 terror attack in southern Israel. The attack killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and the assailants abducted about 250 people. 105 of them were released during a November truce while Israel estimates that 35 hostages out of the 129 remaining in Gaza are dead.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
