U.S. Vice President JD Vance (L) shaking hands with Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif during their meeting before U.S.-Iran peace talks in Islamabad, on April 11, 2026.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Israeli leaders sent mixed signals on the possibility of a ceasefire with Lebanon on Monday (November 11, 2024), with Defence Minister Israel Katz seeming to contradict comments by Foreign Minister Gideon Saar.

Mr. Saar, who replaced Mr. Katz at the foreign ministry this week, told journalists there had been progress towards a ceasefire in Lebanon, where war has raged for more than six weeks as Israel targets Hezbollah.

“There is certain progress,” Mr. Saar said after being asked about a possible ceasefire. “We are working with the Americans on the issue.”

But Mr. Katz, who became defence minister this week, told a forum of top military generals that “there will be no ceasefire, and there will be no break in the strikes against Hezbollah”.

However, he did add that “if the possibility arises and a good proposal is put forward that would allow us to claim victory… we will certainly consider it very seriously”.

Israel escalated air strikes in late September targeting Hezbollah strongholds across Lebanon and sent in ground troops a week later, on September 30.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the operation’s aim is to push Hezbollah north of the Litani River, which flows across southern Lebanon.

Another goal is to stop any attempt by Hezbollah to rearm. The Shiite group is armed and financed by Iran.

Mr. Saar on Monday reiterated Israel’s objectives.

He said Israel would “be ready” for a ceasefire if Hezbollah does not have a presence on the border and is unable to rearm with weapons systems arriving “from Syria, from the sea, from the airport”.

He added: “The main challenge, eventually, will be to enforce what will be agreed.”

“We want to get our citizens back home safely, and if we will meet the right conditions, we will be there. In the meantime, the operation of the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) near our border continues,” Mr. Saar said.

Tens of thousands of Israelis were displaced when Hezbollah began cross-border fire more than a year ago in what it described as support for Palestinian militants Hamas, who attacked Israel on October 7 last year, triggering the ongoing war in Gaza.

Dubai, United Arab Emirates:

Qatar has withdrawn as a key mediator for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage deal and warned Hamas that its Doha office “no longer serves its purpose”, a diplomatic source told AFP on Saturday.

Qatar, with the United States and Egypt, has been engaged in months of fruitless negotiations for a truce with a hostage and prisoner releases.

“The Qataris informed both the Israelis and Hamas that as long as there is a refusal to negotiate a deal in good faith, they cannot continue to mediate,” the source said on condition of anonymity.

“As a consequence, the Hamas political office no longer serves its purpose,” the source said. 

The informed source said Qatar had already “notified both sides, Israel and Hamas as well as the US administration” of its decision.

“The Qataris conveyed to the US administration that they would be ready to re-engage in mediation when both sides… demonstrate a sincere willingness to return to the negotiating table”, the source added. 

Qatar, which is home to a major US military base, has hosted Hamas’s political leadership since 2012 with Washington’s blessing.

During the talks after Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel last year, both Qatari and US officials indicated that the militant group would remain in Doha as long as its presence offered a viable channel of communication.

Qatar said in April that it was reassessing its role as a mediator in the conflict as it was facing criticism, notably from Israeli and US politicians.

At that time, the Qataris gave a similar message over the status of the Hamas office, prompting Hamas officials to leave for Turkey, the diplomatic source said.

But they returned after two weeks at the request of the United States and Israel, as negotiations were “ineffective” while they were in Turkey, the source said.

Apart from a one-week pause in the fighting late last year, during which scores of Hamas-held hostages were released, successive rounds of negotiations have failed to halt the war.

To break the deadlock near the end of US President Joe Biden’s term and in the run-up to this week’s US elections, Washington and Doha last month announced fresh in-person talks to explore new options.

But the latest initiative produced no breakthrough.

The diplomatic source said Qatar had “concluded that there is insufficient willingness from either side, with the mediation efforts becoming more about politics and elections rather than a serious attempt to secure peace”.

Qatar “advised the US administration and both parties that it would not accept being subjected to political exploitation aimed at gaining political leverage at Qatar’s expense while misleading public perception”, the source added.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Some families of hostages held in Gaza believe the latest round of cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas could be the last best chance to set their loved ones free after more than 300 days of captivity.

The families have advocated tirelessly to secure the release of their relatives, who were snatched on October 7, 2023, during Hamas’ cross-border attack that started the war.

Their hope that the latest talks could result in a breakthrough is tinged by 10 months of disappointment – and the growing fear of a wider Mideast war as Israel faces rising tensions with Iran and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group based in Lebanon.

Roughly 110 hostages remain in Gaza after about 100 were freed during a brief cease-fire in late November. More than 40,000 Palestinians have died in the war, according to Gaza health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and militants.

Throughout the war, the families of hostages have pushed on with anguish and despair, rallying Israelis to their cause, lobbying local and foreign lawmakers, pleading that someone put an end to their nightmare.

They’ve watched as multiple rounds of negotiations have crumbled. And they’ve increasingly directed their ire at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who they accuse of prioritising his political survival over the fate of their loved ones.

“We need a cease-fire to get them all back,” said Zahiro Shahar Mor, a nephew of Avraham Munder, 78, who was kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz along with his wife, his daughter and grandson – the latter three having returned during the first and only truce deal. “Had Netanyahu wanted them here, they would have been here.”

Mr. Netanyahu insists he keeps the plight of the hostage’s top of mind.

“The pain these families have endured is beyond words,” Mr. Netanyahu told a joint session of the U.S. Congress last month. “I will not rest until all their loved ones are home.”

He says the best way to free them is to keep up military pressure on Hamas, a position backed by two far-right governing partners who are critical to maintaining his grip on power. They have pledged to topple the government should Mr. Netanyahu proceed with a deal that would release hostages in exchange for freeing Palestinian prisoners convicted of serious crimes or an end to the war.

Mr. Netanyahu has also enraged some of the hostage families throughout the war with comments or actions that appeared to suggest he does not sympathize with their ordeal.

He has only recently suggested remorse for his role in the policy and security failures that led to Hamas’ unprecedented attack, which led to the killing of some 1,200 Israelis. He has been accused of avoiding the families of hostages, especially those whose relatives are known to have died in captivity. In comments leaked to Israeli media, he reportedly said, “Hamas was under more pressure than Israel to move toward a deal because the hostages were ‘suffering but not dying’.”

In fact, more than a third of the 110 hostages still held are said to have died in captivity or on October 7, 2023, their bodies taken to Gaza. Three hostages were mistakenly killed by the Israeli military. Seven hostages were freed in rescue missions, as were several bodies.

The hostage families have watched as their weekly protest in central Tel Aviv has gradually dwindled in size, with Israelis growing weary of the seemingly endless struggle. They have watched the conflict broaden, nearly tipping over into a wider regional war that could eclipse their own plight.

Still, the families have kept up their fight. In July, nearly two dozen met with Mr. Netanyahu in Washington during his visit there.

Gil Dickmann, whose cousin Carmel Gat is being held in Gaza, said Mr. Netanyahu did not make any tangible promise but he left the meeting feeling optimistic that progress could come soon. Instead, weeks have passed with no movement.

“That is an eternity for the hostages,” said Mr. Dickmann, who was among a group of hostage relatives who wore a yellow shirt that read “seal the deal now” in Congress during Mr. Netanyahu’s speech. “Anything could happen to them during that eternity.”

Mr. Dickmann said that attempts by both sides to squeeze as much out of the deal were only making it more elusive.

The families of the eight American-Israeli hostages held an hourlong meeting with both Mr. Netanyahu and President Joe Biden, but the Israeli leader did not make any firm promises on a deal to them either, said Ruby Chen, the father of Itay Chen, who was killed October 7, 2023, his body taken into Gaza.

Mr. Chen said he has drawn optimism surrounding this latest round of talks from his weekly briefings with U.S. officials, who he said view the cease-fire deal as a chance to bring stability to the wider region, after the killings of two militant commanders in Beirut and Tehran sparked fears of a wider war. He urged the U.S. to publicly call out whoever it saw as obstructing the talks, although he declined to point any finger himself.

“The prime minister needs to look hard in the mirror and understand that these are the days that the history book of the state of Israel is being written,” he said. “He needs to decide where he wants to be in that history book.”

Other hostage relatives have had harsher words for the Israeli leader.

“Netanyahu, we know you don’t want a deal. We know that if it was up to you, the hostages would rot and die in captivity,” Yotam Cohen, whose brother Nimrod, 19, is being held captive, said at a protest Thursday (August 16, 2024) ahead of the new round of talks. One protester chanted “their blood is on your hands”.

An Israeli soldier works on a tank near the Gaza border in southern Israel.
| Photo Credit: AP

A spokesman for Hamas’ armed wing said on Sunday its fighters had captured Israeli soldiers during fighting in Jabalia in northern Gaza on Saturday, though the Israeli military denied the claim.

The Hamas armed wing spokesman did not say how many soldiers had been abducted, and showed no proof of the claim.

“Our fighters lured a Zionist force into an ambush inside a tunnel … The fighters withdrew after they left all members of the force dead, wounded, and captured,” Abu Ubaida, the spokesman for Al Qassam Brigades, said in a recorded message broadcast by Al Jazeera early on Sunday.

The Israeli military on Sunday denied the claim by Hamas’ armed wing.

“The IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) clarifies that there is no incident in which a soldier was abducted,” the military said in a statement.

The comments by Abu Ubaida came hours after prospects for a resumption of mediated Gaza ceasefire talks grew on Saturday.

An official with knowledge of the matter said a decision had been taken to resume the talks next week after the chief of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency met the head of the CIA and the prime minister of Qatar.

The source, who declined to be identified by name or nationality, said it had been decided that “in the coming week negotiations will open based on new proposals led by the mediators, Egypt and Qatar and with active U.S. involvement.”

A Hamas official later denied Israeli media reports the talks would resume in Cairo on Tuesday, telling Reuters: “There is no date.”

After more than seven months of war in Gaza, the mediators have struggled to secure a breakthrough, with Israel seeking the release of hostages held by Hamas and Hamas seeking an end to the war and a release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

Nearly 36,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive, Gaza’s health ministry says. Israel began the operation in response to Hamas-led militants attacking southern Israeli communities on Oct. 7, killing around 1,200 people and seizing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.