Cairo, 3 March 2024 (dpa/MIA) – A team from the Palestinian Hamas movement and mediators have arrived in Cairo to resume negotiations for a truce deal with Israel in the Gaza Strip, an Egyptian television channel reported on Sunday.

Delegations from Qatar and the United States had also arrived for the new round of talks, the state-linked Al Qahera News added. 

There was no immediate word about the presence of an Israeli team.

Israel said earlier it would send a delegation to attend indirect talks in Cairo only if Hamas presented a list of those hostages it holds who are still alive.

It also demanded to know whether Hamas agreed to the number of Palestinian prisoners to be released by Israel mentioned in the last proposal submitted by the mediators.

The talks come amid grim warnings of a catastrophic humanitarian situation in the densely populated Gaza Strip.

Qatar, Egypt and the US have been trying to broker a new ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel in Gaza for weeks, in a deal which should facilitate the release of the Israeli hostages still held in the coastal strip.

On Saturday, Al Qahera News quoted what it termed as a top Egyptian security source as saying that Cairo was making efforts to reach a truce deal before the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, beginning next week.

“There is significant progress in the truce negotiations. We seek to reach a fair agreement,” the source added without elaborating.

In November, Egypt, Qatar and the US brokered a temporary ceasefire deal agreed by Israel and Hamas that also facilitated hostage-for-prisoner swaps.

Israel has been bombarding Gaza for months, since Hamas militants launched unprecedented bloody attacks on Israel on October 7 that included massacres of civilians.

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