Key mediator Qatar on Tuesday stressed the urgency of brokering a ceasefire in Gaza after Hamas showed a "positive response" to a proposal, but Israel has yet to weigh in as its military prepares an offensive on some of the territory's most populated areas.
The prospect of an expanded assault on areas sheltering hundreds of thousands of Palestinians has sparked condemnation inside Israel and abroad. Most war-weary Palestinians see no place in Gaza as safe, not even declared humanitarian zones, after 22 months of war.
"If this (ceasefire) proposal fails, the crisis will exacerbate," Majed al-Ansari, a spokesperson for Qatar's foreign ministry, told journalists, adding they have yet to hear from Israel on it.
Qatar is among the countries mediating to end the war. Al-Ansari said Hamas had agreed to terms under discussion. He declined to provide details but said the proposal was "almost identical" to one previously advanced by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.
That US proposal was for a 60-day ceasefire, during which some of the remaining captives would be released and the sides would negotiate a lasting ceasefire and the return of the rest.
"If we get to a deal, it shouldn’t be expected that it would be instantaneously implemented," al-Ansari said. "We’re not there yet."
That cautious assessment came a day after the foreign minister of Egypt, another mediator, said they were were pushing for a phased deal and noted that Qatar's prime minister had joined the talks between Hamas leaders and Arab mediators.
Witkoff has been invited to rejoin the talks, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty told The Associated Press. Witkoff pulled out of negotiations less than a month ago.
It was not clear how Witkoff has responded to the invitation.
An Israeli official on Monday said the country's positions, including on the release of all captives, had not changed. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak with the media.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said a final push is needed to "complete the defeat of Hamas," vowing to continue the war until all the captives are returned and Hamas has been disarmed.
Netanyahu, however, has been long-accused of deliberately prolonging the war in a bid to cling onto power amid declining domestic popularity. Captives' families have also criticised the Israeli premier for failing to secure their release and for intensifying attacks on Gaza, potentially endangering their lives.
Hospitals in Gaza said they had received the bodies of 28 Palestinians killed on Tuesday, including women and children, as Israeli strikes continued across the territory. Among them were nine people killed while seeking aid, officials at two hospitals told The Associated Press.
The deaths were recorded across Gaza, including in central Deir al-Balah, southern Khan Younis and near aid distribution points, hospital officials said.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the controversial Israeli-backed private American contractor that has become the primary distributor of aid in Gaza since May, operates those sites.
Nasser Hospital also said an airstrike killed a mother, father and three children in their tent overnight in Muwasi, a camp for hundreds of thousands of civilians.
"An entire family was gone in an instant. What was their fault?" the children's grandfather, Majed al-Mashwakhi, said, sobbing.
Neither the GHF nor Israel’s military immediately responded to questions about the casualties reported by Nasser, Awda and al-Aqsa hospitals.
The Palestinian death toll in the war surpassed 62,000 on Monday, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
In addition to that toll, other Palestinians have died from malnutrition and starvation, including three reported in the past 24 hours, the ministry said Tuesday. It says 154 adults have died of malnutrition-related causes since late June, when it began counting such deaths, and 112 children have died of malnutrition-related causes since the war began in October 2023.