Two years into one of the bloodiest conflicts of our time, negotiators from Israel and Hamas sat down for a second day of indirect peace talks in the Egyptian resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh.
Both sides are scrutinising a 20-point peace plan proposed by US president Donald Trump — talks which senior officials briefed on the discussions told The Independent are “the closest we’ve ever been” to the end of the war.
The deal — originally 21 points long — was first presented to leaders from Arab and Muslim-majority countries in New York earlier last month. It was changed at the eleventh hour, initially causing confusion and concern in some quarters that the process might collapse before it had started.
In the days before the plan was announced at a press conference between Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister held a lengthy meeting with US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner in Washington DC, where he reportedly had the opportunity “to weigh in” and make changes.
Last minute changes to Trump’s plan
The Independent understands the biggest alteration made was the removal of a point demanding that Israel agrees not to bomb or attack Doha again. It was decided the peace deal should focus on Gaza, and Trump insisted Netanyahu participate in a trilateral call with Doha to apologise to the Qatari leadership.
Changes were also made to ensure Hamas disarmament was a key condition, and the deal directly linked the staged withdrawal of Israeli forces to the demilitarisation of the Strip, it is understood.
But despite these unexpected amendments, talks began at 6pm Egyptian time on Monday evening in the resort town, kicking off with four hours of meetings with a break for dinner. Talks continued on Tuesday morning.
It was a tentative start, but described as “positive” by those briefed on the goings-on, with “both sides negotiating in good faith”.
Interestingly, the highest-level delegates from each side and the mediating countries including Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, were not present.
People slated to attend, like Witkoff, Kushner and Ron Dermer, Israel’s head of negotiations and minister of strategic affairs, are apparently in Egypt but not yet in the negotiating rooms.
That is because, at least from the Israeli side, there is caution, with one official voicing concern about whether Hamas “were serious” or not.
Instead, the technical teams got to grips with the nuts and bolts of the plan.
Timeline of delivery
Donald Trump has been overtly positive about the talks, suggesting “tremendous progress” had been made and a deal is imminent.
On the ground there was “optimism”, but checked by a reality that the delivery of a deal this complicated will take more than just a few days.
Right now, “the specifics in terms of where and when” is being battled out, one official briefed on the talks told The Independent.
“Both Hamas and Israel agree on the fundamentals of the 20-point plan. The current round of talks is focused on tackling the specific details, which has been a lengthy process in the past,” the official warned.
Trump’s plan is being treated like a guidebook of ideas rather than the plan itself. And so, like the last ceasefire deal in January, the new deal will include least three phases — but with one critical difference.
January’s agreement only laid out the solid details of phase one, with an understanding that the specifics of the next phases would be negotiated as soon as the first stage was in progress.
But that ceasefire never got beyond the first phase, collapsing in March. At the time, Israel and Hamas blamed each other, and Middle East diplomats told The Independent that Israel simply “never showed up” to even discuss how to move it forward.
To avoid this happening again, negotiators want to hammer out all the timelines and action plans ahead of time.
“The difference from previous rounds is that the objective is to have something comprehensive that includes pre-agreed phases prior to its implementation, rather than prolonged negotiations for phase 2 during phase 1 — like we had in the January deal,” said one official with knowledge of the talks.
“This deal is designed to give reassurances to both sides that it is comprehensive. And once we enter phase one and both sides commit to what’s required from them, we move on to phase 2.”
Phase one: hostage-prisoner release and partial Israeli withdrawal
The Independent understands that talks opened with working out what is being referred to as the “trigger” of the deal: an immediate ceasefire, then Hamas militants releasing the remaining 48 hostages, dead and alive, which in turn, according to the latest draft of the deal, will see the release of nearly 2,000 Palestinians serving life terms and people detained since October 2023. During that period, the remains of more than 700 deceased Palestinians from Gaza that Israel is holding could also be returned.
This will happen in tandem with another key part of Phase One: an initial withdrawal of Israeli troops, similar to what US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has referred to publicly as the “yellow line”.
Israeli media has described the “yellow line”, at some points, as a good 6km into Gaza, and means Israeli troops would remain occupying cities like Rafah along the border with Egypt, and in the north, areas like Bait Lahia.
But officials briefed on the talks said that that map has to be finalised, as does the timetable and practical aspects of that withdrawal — a topic which was on the negotiating table today.
Egyptian officials told Al-Akhbar newspaper that one of the main worries from Israeli officials concerns who would administer Gaza during the initial days of their troops moving out of areas of Gaza: Israel has refused to allow Hamas to have any on-the-ground responsibility, even temporarily.
Phase Two: ‘the handover of governance’
Phase Two would see “the full handover of governance”, so the start of an interim body of Palestinian technocrats tasked with managing the day-to-day running of the enclave, overseen by what Trump has called “a board of peace”, headed up by himself and former UK prime minister Tony Blair.
Palestinian officials have voiced their worries about the make-up of this transitional body and who else is on the board of peace.
Phase Two would also see the initial deployment of the “international stabilisation force”, as outlined in Trump’s plan — which is made up of foreign and likely Arab forces intended to train up a vetted Palestinian police force.
The focus of discussions on Phase Two will be the composition of the “technocratic” government. Officials from the Middle East region made it clear that “there is agreement across the board that the Palestinians should be governed by Palestinians themselves”. They also believe that this should pave the way for a handover to a “reformed” Palestinian Authority, the internationally recognised body that is anchored in the occupied West Bank.
Phase three: Palestinian statehood?
But perhaps the bitterest sticking point is the pathway to a Palestinian state, which Palestinians want to be part of the final phase. It supported by key Arab and Muslim-majority nations including mediators Egypt and Qatar. The UK and other European countries have recently recognised Palestine.
But statehood is only vaguely referred to in Trump’s plan — not as an aim or as a promise, but something which “may” be explored if the PA reforms.
Netanyahu, at the press conference announcing the plan, made it abundantly clear that Israel does not support a Palestinian state.
He also spoke of Israel retaining “security responsibility” of the enclave. That was at odds with Hamas’s own statement nominally accepting parts of the deal and declaring it a pathway to Palestinian self-determination.
As the talks grind on, there is a long way to go but “there is certainly hope”, the official said.
“Given the discussions that are taking place and the detailed and lengthy proposal,” the person added.
“I think now there’s a good sense within the building that this is the closest we’ve ever been and both parties are now negotiating in good faith,”
