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Previous indirect talks between Israel and Hamas, facilitated by mediators, ended without any results to end the Israel-Palestine war.
Published On 18 Aug 2025
Qatar’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani has held talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to discuss a ceasefire agreement in Gaza, as Israel intensifies its offensive to seize Gaza City.
“El-Sisi and the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Qatar stressed the importance of efforts to reach a ceasefire agreement in Gaza,” according to a statement by the Egyptian presidency on Monday.
The two leaders “affirmed their rejection of the reoccupation of the Gaza Strip and the displacement of Palestinians”, as Israel plans to seize Gaza City and force Palestinians from the enclave’s main urban centre. They also insisted that establishing a Palestinian state is “the path to peace”.
A source told Al Jazeera that “intensive discussions” are currently taking place in Egypt between a Hamas delegation and mediators. Hamas, which governs Gaza, has been calling for a ceasefire, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has rebuffed the offer.
Egypt, Qatar and the United States have been mediating between Israel and Hamas since the beginning of the war in Gaza that has killed 62,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children.
Efforts by mediators have so far failed to secure a lasting ceasefire in the ongoing war, which over more than 22 months has created a dire humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.
A truce brokered by Qatari, Egyptian and US mediators that came into force in January was broken by Israel in March. Since then, it has imposed a total blockade, causing famine and starvation. More than 260 Palestinians have died due to the Israeli-induced starvation crisis.
The latest round of indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas, facilitated in Doha by mediators, lasted for several weeks before ending on July 25 without any results.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty, visiting the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on Monday, said that Qatar’s prime minister was visiting “to consolidate our existing common efforts in order to apply maximum pressure on the two sides to reach a deal as soon as possible”.
Alluding to the dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people living in the Gaza Strip, where United Nations agencies and aid groups have warned of a humanitarian crisis, Abdelatty stressed the urgency of reaching an agreement.
“The current situation on the ground is beyond imagination,” he said.
Thousands of Palestinians have been forced to flee again from Gaza City ahead of an impending Israeli offensive.
‘Genocides don’t end through negotiated solutions’
Commenting on the Qatari prime minister’s trip to Egypt, Abdullah Al-Arian, an associate professor of history at Georgetown University in Qatar, said it was important to remember that similar negotiations have occurred before, but it is “a lack of Israeli political will” that has ultimately stalled them.
Israel “has continued to pursue this genocide and taking it to new, horrific, unprecedented levels”, he told Al Jazeera, adding that there has been a lack of international pressure to secure a ceasefire agreement.
“Historically, genocides don’t end through negotiated solutions … They end usually because the party that committed the genocide is forced to end it, usually through external pressure, external intervention of some kind, and that has not happened yet,” the academic stressed.
On Monday, human rights group Amnesty International accused Israel of enacting a “deliberate policy” of starvation in Gaza as the UN and aid groups continued to warn of famine in the Palestinian enclave.
In a report quoting displaced Palestinians and medical staff who have treated malnourished children, Amnesty said: “Israel is carrying out a deliberate campaign of starvation in the occupied Gaza Strip.”
The UN and the international community have been slamming Israel for blocking necessary aid from entering the war-torn enclave.
Source:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
