Netanyahu is under pressure at home to strike a deal to free the hostages.

 

Netanyahu is under pressure at home to strike a deal to free the hostages.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/04/07/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news

 

Here’s what we know:

Negotiators were expected to discuss potential terms of a temporary cease-fire and the release of Israeli hostages. More protests were planned in Israel.

 

Netanyahu is under pressure at home to strike a deal to free the hostages.

The recovery of a hostage’s body in Gaza fuels anger at protests in Tel Aviv.

Israel and its military are on alert, awaiting a promised strike by Iran.

 

Netanyahu is under pressure at home to strike a deal to free the hostages.

 

International mediators were set to meet in Cairo on Sunday to pick up negotiations aimed at brokering a temporary cease-fire in Gaza and the release of hostages held in the enclave.

 

Officials from the United States, Egypt and Qatar were expected in Cairo, along with delegations from Israel and from Hamas. President Biden is pressing participants to make a deal, but it is not clear whether new proposals will be on the table.

 

The talks, which have been stalled for months, come as tensions in the region are mounting. Iran vowed on Friday to avenge an Israeli strike on an Iranian Embassy building in Syria earlier in the week that killed senior commanders of Iran’s elite Quds Force. Israelis were still bracing for retaliation on Sunday, although the timing and potential shape of an attack were not clear.

 

Mr. Biden spoke to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel by phone on Thursday, repeating his call for a negotiated deal that would result in an “immediate cease-fire” and the release of hostages. Mr. Biden on Friday also sent messages to President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt and Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, the emir of Qatar, urging them to increase pressure on Hamas to make a deal, a senior administration official said on Friday.

 

The outlines of a possible agreement have been clear for months but the details have proven divisive. The terms would include a temporary cease-fire, the release of hostages kidnapped by Hamas during the Oct. 7 assault on Israel and the release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. Among other points of dispute, according to American officials, are the ratio of prisoners to hostages, the sequence of the releases and the return of Palestinian civilians to northern Gaza.

 

The head of the American delegation in Cairo is William J. Burns, the C.I.A. director, and leading the Israelis will be David Barnea, the chief of Mossad, the country’s spy agency. They were expected to meet with Egyptian and Qatari officials to try to hash out a consensus. The Egyptians and Qataris have served as intermediaries between Hamas and Israel, whose representatives do not speak directly.

 

Hamas said on Saturday that a delegation of its leadership would be in Cairo, but that it was sticking to an earlier proposal that it submitted in mid-March, including total Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, which Israeli officials vehemently reject.

 

The talks come amid mounting anger in Israel toward the government on the six-month anniversary of the war. Protesters have rallied in cities across the country, demanding that Mr. Netanyahu do more to bring the hostages home.

 

Those calls grew louder on Saturday, after the Israeli military said that soldiers in Gaza had retrieved the body of Elad Katzir, a hostage who had twice appeared in videos during his captivity. At a vigil for Mr. Katzir, on Saturday night in Tel Aviv, relatives of hostages still held in Gaza called for immediate government action.

 

— Ephrat Livni