ISTANBUL: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday said his country&nbsp;would participate in a &quot;task force&quot; to oversee the implementation of a ceasefire deal reached between Israel and Hamas. &quot;We will hopefully join the task force that will monitor the implementation of the agreement on the ground,&quot; Erdogan said. Turkey, which has been closely involved in the negotiations, sent a team to the talks in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh. The agreement, which will be signed in Egypt on Thursday, involves freeing the remaining hostages and is seen as a major step towards ending the two-year war that has killed tens of thousands of people and unleashed a humanitarian catastrophe. &quot;It is of great importance to urgently deliver comprehensive humanitarian aid to Gaza, exchange hostages and prisoners, and for Israel to immediately cease its attacks,&quot; Erdogan said. He also promised Turkey would help reconstruction efforts in Gaza.

Palestinians celebrate following the announcement that Israel and Hamas have agreed to the first phase of a peace plan to pause the fighting, outside Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip, Thursday, Oct. 9, 2025. (AP)

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Middle East

The agreement, which will be signed in Egypt on Thursday, involves freeing the remaining hostages and is seen as a major step towards ending the two-year war.

Erdogan says Turkey to join 'task force' to monitor Gaza deal

JERUSALEM: Hamas said Tuesday it was working to overcome &quot;all obstacles&quot; as the Palestinian leaders held indirect talks with Israel aimed at ending the two-year Gaza war. &quot;The delegation of the movement participating in the current negotiations in Egypt seeks to surmount all obstacles to achieving an agreement that fulfils the aspirations of our people in Gaza,&quot; senior Hamas official Fawzi Barhoum said in a televised speech.

Hamas said it is working to overcome all obstacles in ongoing indirect talks with Israel in Egypt, aiming to reach an agreement that meets the aspirations of the Palestinian people in Gaza after two years of war

Hamas says working to 'surmount all obstacles' in Gaza talks

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ISLAMABAD: Two years after the outbreak of the Gaza war, the conflict continues to devastate civilian life, with United Nations (UN) reports highlighting widespread destruction of schools, infrastructure, and essential services across the enclave.&nbsp;Despite growing humanitarian concerns, ceasefire efforts remain stalled as Israel and Hamas struggle to bridge key differences over hostages, withdrawal terms, and long-term security guarantees. &nbsp;Widespread destructionA UN report published on May 7, 2025, found that more than 400 schools in Gaza had been directly hit. The IRDNA reported in February 2025 that 88% of the 48,987 establishments in Gaza&rsquo;s commerce and industry sector had been damaged or destroyed.&nbsp;Further, a UNOSAT report on July 8, 2025, stated that 77% of the total road network in Gaza had been damaged. According to the OCHA, as of September 9, 2025, 69% (520 out of 756) of public WASH facilities and assets were located within Israeli-militarized zones.&nbsp;The FAO also reported that as of April 2025, 83% of agricultural water wells had been damaged, worsening the humanitarian crisis.&nbsp;<img src="https://paktv-assets-7d41fab8.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/16bd0213-68b7-483f-8108-4ea4f8ab0166.jpg" style="width: 601px;" class="fr-fic fr-dib">A tent camp for displaced Palestinians stretches among the ruins of buildings destroyed by Israeli bombardments in west Gaza City, Saturday, June 21, 2025. (AP/File) Hostage negotiations and stalled diplomacyHostage negotiations remain at the center of diplomatic efforts. Israeli officials say 48 hostages are still being held in Gaza, with about 20 believed to be alive. Hamas has stated it will release them only in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and Israeli withdrawal.&nbsp;Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war until all captives are freed and Hamas is disarmed, according to Israeli officials. <img src="https://paktv-assets-7d41fab8.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/f6e86711-505f-4ffc-bf59-d77d449fa562.jpg" style="width: 597px;" class="fr-fic fr-dib fr-fil">In this aerial view, Palestinians check the rubble of a building destroyed by an Israeli strike in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on September 28, 2025. (AFP/File)&nbsp;SurveillanceIn a related development, The Guardian reported that a 2021 meeting between Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and the commander of Israel&rsquo;s Unit 8200 led to the unit gaining access to a segregated area of Microsoft&rsquo;s Azure cloud.&nbsp;The investigation claimed this platform was later used to store and analyze recordings of millions of phone calls made by Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.&nbsp;Microsoft stated that Nadella was unaware of the nature of the data and that the company was taking steps to ensure compliance with its terms of service.&nbsp;Last month, the Associated Press reported that Microsoft disabled services to an Israeli military unit after an internal review found its products had been used for mass surveillance of Palestinians. The company acknowledged selling advanced AI and cloud services during the war but said an internal review found no evidence that Azure was used to target or harm individuals. <img src="https://paktv-assets-7d41fab8.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/480189c0-75f6-48b3-bf47-3ded1c4cde8a.jpg" style="width: 593px;" class="fr-fic fr-dib fr-fil">This picture taken during a media tour organised by the Israeli army on October 3, 2025, shows an Israeli army soldier holding a mounted machine gun in front of destroyed buildings in the vicinity of the Jordanian Field Hospital in Gaza City. (AFP/File)&nbsp;Mediation effortsInternational mediation has intensified as both Israel and Hamas express cautious support for a United States-backed plan proposing a ceasefire, hostage releases, and expanded humanitarian aid.&nbsp;However, key sticking points, such as the timeline of Israeli withdrawal, Hamas&rsquo;s disarmament, and guarantees for a lasting ceasefire, remain unresolved. Initial talks in Sharm El-Sheikh signaled some willingness to negotiate, but continued Israeli airstrikes, internal political tensions in Israel, and the complexity of hostage recovery efforts make a swift resolution unlikely.&nbsp;OutlookWhile both Israel and Hamas have voiced support for the broad principles of US President Donald Trump&rsquo;s plan, analysts caution that a comprehensive peace deal remains distant.&nbsp;As the world marks the second anniversary of the war&rsquo;s start, the likelihood of ending the Gaza conflict remains cautiously optimistic but fraught with challenges, even as global attention once again turns to the region.

Two years into the Gaza war, UN reports reveal massive civilian devastation, with 77% of Gaza’s infrastructure damaged. Ceasefire and hostage talks remain deadlocked as Israel resists withdrawal and Hamas demands guarantees, despite renewed mediation

Two years on: War on Gaza persists amid rising civilian toll

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Monday that he was &quot;pretty sure&quot; a Gaza peace deal was possible and said Hamas was agreeing to &quot;very important&quot; issues as talks with Israel started. &quot;I have red lines, if certain things aren&#39;t met, we&#39;re not going to do it,&quot; Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked if he had preconditions, including Hamas agreeing to disarm. &quot;But I think we&#39;re doing very well, and I think Hamas has been agreeing to things that are very important.&quot; Trump said he was optimistic about the chances of a deal as delegations from Hamas and Israel began indirect talks in Egypt on ending the war under his 20-point plan. &quot;I think we&#39;re going to have a deal. It&#39;s a hard thing for me to say that when for years and years they&#39;ve been trying to have a deal,&quot; Trump said. &quot;We&#39;re going to have a Gaza deal, I&#39;m pretty sure, yeah.&quot; Trump also dismissed a report that he had accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of being negative about the talks, saying that Netanyahu had been &quot;very positive about the deal.&quot;

Americas

US president says he is optimistic about the chances of a deal as delegations from Hamas and Israel begin indirect talks in Egypt on ending the Gaza war under his 20-point plan.

Trump says Hamas 'agreeing to things that are very important'

CAIRO: Delegations from Hamas and Israel on Monday began indirect talks in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh on ending the nearly two-year war in Gaza, Egyptian state-linked media reported. Al-Qahera News, which is linked to state intelligence, said the delegations &quot;are discussing preparing ground conditions for the release of detainees and prisoners&quot;, in line with a proposal from US President Donald Trump to halt hostilities. &quot;Egyptian and Qatari mediators are working with both sides to establish a mechanism&quot; for the exchange of hostages held in Gaza for the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, they added. Behind closed doors and under tight security, negotiators will speak through mediators shuttling back and forth, only weeks after Israel tried to kill Hamas&#39;s lead negotiators in a strike on Qatar. The Hamas delegation, led by top negotiator Khalil al-Hayya who survived the attack in Doha, held a meeting with Egyptian intelligence officials ahead of the talks, according to an Egyptian security source. This round of negotiations, launched on the eve of the second anniversary of Hamas&#39;s October 7, 2023 attack that sparked the war, &quot;may last for several days&quot;, said a Palestinian source close to Hamas&#39;s leadership. &quot;We expect the negotiations to be difficult and complex, given the occupation&#39;s intentions to continue its war of extermination,&quot; he told AFP. Trump, whose envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner are expected in Egypt, has urged negotiators to &quot;move fast&quot; to end the war in Gaza, where Israeli strikes continued on Monday. At least seven Palestinians were killed in the latest Israeli air strikes, according to Mahmud Basal, spokesman for Gaza&#39;s civil defence agency. AFP footage showed explosions in the Gaza Strip, with plumes of smoke rising over the skyline, even after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Israel must stop bombing the territory. &#39;Require several days&#39;Both Hamas and Israel have responded positively to Trump&#39;s proposal, but reaching an agreement on the details is set to be a herculean task. The plan envisages the disarmament of Hamas, which the militant group is unlikely to accept. It also provides for the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, but Israel&#39;s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to redeploy troops &quot;deep inside&quot; the territory while securing the release of hostages. According to the Palestinian source, the initial hostage-prisoner exchange will &quot;require several days, depending on field conditions related to Israeli withdrawals, the cessation of bombardment and the suspension of all types of air operations&quot;. Previous rounds of negotiations have also stalled over the names of Palestinian prisoners the Islamist group proposed for release. Negotiations will look to &quot;determine the date of a temporary truce&quot;, a Hamas official said, as well as create conditions for a first phase of the plan, in which 47 hostages held in Gaza are to be released in return for hundreds of Palestinian detainees. Mirjana Spoljaric, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has coordinated previous exchanges, said its teams were standing at the ready &quot;to help bring hostages and detainees back to their families&quot;. The ICRC said it was ready to facilitate aid access, which must resume &quot;at full capacity&quot; and be distributed safely across the territory, where the UN has declared a famine. &#39;MOVE FAST&#39;Posting on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, Trump praised &quot;positive discussions with Hamas&quot; and allies around the world including Arab and Muslim nations. &quot;I am told that the first phase should be completed this week, and I am asking everyone to MOVE FAST,&quot; he wrote. On Monday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi praised Trump&#39;s plan saying it offered &quot;the right path to lasting peace and stability&quot;. A Palestinian source close to Hamas said it would halt its military operations in parallel with Israel stopping its bombardment and withdrawing its troops from Gaza City. Israeli military chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir warned if the negotiations failed, then the military would &quot;return to fighting&quot; in Gaza. Militants seized 251 hostages during their October 7, 2023 attack, 47 of whom are still in Gaza. Of those, the Israeli military says 25 are dead. According to Trump&#39;s plan, in return for the hostages, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from Gaza taken during the war. Hamas has insisted it should have a say in the territory&#39;s future, though Trump&#39;s roadmap stipulates that it and other factions &quot;not have any role in the governance of Gaza&quot;. Under the proposal, administration of the territory would be taken up by a technocratic body overseen by a transitional authority headed by Trump himself. &quot;We hope Trump will pressure Netanyahu and force him to stop the war,&quot; said Ahmad Barbakh, from the Al-Mawasi area. &quot;We want the prisoner exchange deal to be completed quickly so that Israel has no excuse to continue the war.&quot; Hamas&#39;s October 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures. Israel&#39;s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 67,160 Palestinians, according to health ministry figures in the Hamas-run territory that the United Nations considers reliable.

Hamas and Israel began indirect ceasefire and hostage-exchange talks in Egypt, mediated by Cairo and Qatar under Trump’s peace proposal. The Red Cross confirmed readiness to assist, as strikes in Gaza continued despite ongoing negotiations

Indirect talks on ending Gaza war begin in Sharm El-Sheikh: Egypt media

JERUSALEM: Israel&#39;s military chief warned on Sunday that if negotiations to secure the release of hostages fail to achieve their aims, the military will return to fighting in Gaza. &quot;There is no ceasefire (at the moment), but the operational situation has changed, with the political level converting the tools and achievements you have gained through military action into political gains,&quot; Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir told a group of soldiers deployed in Gaza. &quot;If the political effort fails, we will return to fighting,&quot; he added, according to a statement issued by the military.

 Israeli soldiers take position along the Gaza Strip border in southern Israel, Sunday, Oct. 5, 2025. (AP)

Israel’s military chief warned that fighting in Gaza will resume if hostage negotiations fail, emphasizing that current political efforts aim to convert military achievements into diplomatic gains amid an uneasy halt in combat operations.

Articles tagged with "Gaza Deal"

Erdogan says Turkey to join 'task force' to monitor Gaza deal

Hamas says working to 'surmount all obstacles' in Gaza talks

Two years on: War on Gaza persists amid rising civilian toll

Trump says Hamas 'agreeing to things that are very important'

Indirect talks on ending Gaza war begin in Sharm El-Sheikh: Egypt media

Israel army chief warns fighting in Gaza will resume if talks fail