Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza
Hamas's unconditional release of US-Israeli citizen Edan Alexander this month had raised hopes that a Gaza ceasefire deal was within reach. Nearly two weeks later, that optimism has all but evaporated.
In place of hope is the derailment of the latest round of Gaza ceasefire negotiations, as Israel presses on with a major military offensive that is killing scores of Palestinians daily, while the prospect of death from hunger hangs over many of the territory's 2.3 million residents.
Hamas released Mr Alexander, who was serving in the Israeli military when he was captured, as a goodwill gesture to US President Donald Trump as he embarked on a regional tour that took him to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE last week. The idea was that this would prompt the Trump administration to pressure Israel into agreeing to a ceasefire deal.
It never happened.
A Hamas official based in Beirut said on Thursday the latest round of ceasefire talks in Qatar had collapsed and blamed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for sabotaging them.
“As always, every time the atmosphere becomes positive and we get close to a deal, Netanyahu appears to sabotage the talks and block the path to an agreement for his own personal interests,” he said.
Israeli media, meanwhile, reported that Mr Netanyahu's government had recalled its negotiators from the talks in Qatar's capital, Doha.
Sources told The National that Israel's three-man delegation appeared to have had no mandate to negotiate and spent more time in their hotel rooms than at the negotiating table or with the mediators from the US, Egypt and Qatar.
"The whole process appeared to gradually lose steam soon after Edan Alexander was freed," said one of the sources. "The Hamas negotiators felt cheated and betrayed, and the Egyptian and Qatari mediators were deeply frustrated by the lack of progress after the initial burst of optimism.
"It is almost like they [the Israelis] went to Doha to stymie the process," the source added.
In the run-up to Mr Alexander's release on May 12, US mediators held direct talks with Hamas officials in Doha and everyone involved, including the mediators, became more hopeful than they had been in months that a deal could be clinched.
But the sources said Hamas, dejected by the lack of a US reward for Mr Alexander's release, had rejected the latest truce proposal.
The proposal echoed ideas first suggested by US envoy Steve Witkoff and embraced by Israel, they said. It provided for a six-week truce, the resumption of aid deliveries to Gaza and the release of 10 hostages along with the remains of half of those who died in captivity.
The plan offered no guarantees for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza or a permanent ceasefire, which are core to Hamas's demand for a comprehensive deal under which it will release all 58 hostages – of whom only 20 are believed to be alive – in return for a truce of five to 10 years and the freedom of hundreds of Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
Hamas has in recent months also signalled its willingness to forgo any role in the postwar government and reconstruction of Gaza, and to transform itself into a political party. It has also suggested it is prepared to lay down, but not surrender, its arms and for some of its leaders to leave Gaza to live in exile.
As the Doha talks collapsed, Israel kept up its relentless bombardment of Gaza, where the entire population is deemed to be at risk of famine. It also declared its intention to bring the entire strip under the control of its military.
Israel is now under mounting pressure, including from traditional allies, to halt its expanded offensive and allow aid into the territory. Foreign ministers of the EU agreed on Tuesday to review the bloc's co-operation accord with Israel, which includes trade.
Egypt, whose relations with Israel have been fraught since the Gaza war broke out 19 months ago, said on Thursday it welcomed the "marked change" in the position of international parties that now reject Israel's "disgraceful violations" in Gaza.
"Egypt views these changes as a reflection of a correct course and deserved support from the international community for the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people," said a Foreign Ministry statement.
Bound by a 1979 peace treaty with Israel, Egypt has been enraged by its neighbour's conduct in Gaza, where more than 53,700 Palestinians have been killed since the war began. It is now routinely issuing strongly worded condemnations of Israel's actions in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
The level of Cairo's criticism increased dramatically after Israel's military seized the Palestinian side of the Gaza-Egypt border last May, including the Rafah crossing, the only exit and entry point of the enclave not controlled by Israel.
