In its Thursday issue, the State-owned Al Qahera News revealed that a team from Egypt is currently holding discussions with the representatives of Hamas in Cairo in a fresh effort to reconvene ceasefire talks for Gaza. The two parties are negotiating towards achieving serenity after a stormy showdown that took place on October 7, 2023, as sources of the Egyptian authority put it, following the Hamas aggression against Israel.

Mediation attempts, mostly led by Egypt and Qatar, are being driven towards the signing of an agreement for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in which the earlier rounds of negotiations remained stuck in August.

Al Aqsa TV reported the arrival of a delegation from Hamas, headed by senior negotiators of Hamas, Khalil Al-Hayya, in Cairo to meet with the chief of the General Intelligence Agency, Hassan Mahmoud Rashad of Egypt, for negotiations on the terms that would be under any possible ceasefire along with other measures.

In a parallel development, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Egypt’s new push to negotiate a possible hostage deal in Gaza opens the door for cooperation in freeing hostages as part of a larger settlement.

Qatar and the United States raised the stakes in the games of diplomacy. American and Israeli officials are due to sit down together in Doha in the coming days to consult on how they may agree on the terms for a ceasefire and the means to implement the hostages’ release. The two nations reaffirmed their willingness to ensure that the engagements in hostilities and fight reach an end, hence bringing the impasse in Gaza to a resolution and showing that the superficial engagements have become bolder at a time when human loss of the destructive wars has evolved beyond the basic need for a ceasefire.

Egypt and Qatar are involved in the negotiations, which are essential in the peace-building processes in the region. That the current Cairo round and the prospective Doha round are driven by regional and global powers to offer a long-term exit from the war and address the need for a secure and humanitarian situation for Gaza says a great deal about their genuine intent.