Mossad chief David Barnea is expected to travel to Doha on Monday for talks on a possible hostage release deal. American special envoy to the Middle East Brett McGurk is already in the Qatari capital, indicating the importance that the Biden administration attaches to the meetings and the efforts to reach a deal before Donald Trump takes office on January 20th.
"This is a critical day for the negotiations between Israel and Hamas," a Palestinian source told the Qatari Al Araby Al Jadeed newspaper on Sunday adding that the mediators were able to bridge the gap between the sides and await the response of the Israeli government later on Sunday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu scheduled a security consultation for the afternoon on Sunday, a day after the Hamas released a video of IDF solder Liri Elbag who has been held hostage for 457 days, since the October 7 massacre.
Netanyahu invited the members of the small forum of the cabinet for the meeting that was announced by the Prime Minister's Office earlier with a claim that it was not in regard to the hostages.
The issues that were outstanding and prevented an agreement from being reached remain the number of hostages that would be released. The Israeli aim, according to published reports, was to have at least 24 hostages freed in the first phase of the deal including wounded men under the age of 50.
Protesters demand hostages be released
(Lior Sharon)
Hamas insists that demand was not included in the "agreements" thus far and demand a larger number of convicted murderers to be included in the Palestinian prisoners that Israel would release from prison, in exchange.
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Another obstacle was the Israeli demand to receive a list of all live hostages, which Hamas says it would not be able to supply unless there is a week of lull in the fighting. Israel has offered a truce for a number of days if Hamas releases some hostages as a gesture of good will, before a full list of names is delivered.