US President Donald Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi will co-chair a Gaza summit on Monday in the Egyptian town of Sharm el-Sheikh, with UN chief Antonio Guterres and the leaders of more than 20 countries expected to attend.
The summit follows a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, effective from noon on Friday and appeared to be holding over the weekend. Key steps, including the release of hostages and the delivery of aid, are set to be executed, which could determine whether this deal can lead to lasting peace in the war-torn region.
As the deal comes into effect, the 72-hour period for Hamas to release all remaining hostages has also begun. Hamas has until 12:00 local time on Monday to release all Israeli hostages, and Israel is expected to release 1,700 detainees from Gaza and about 250 Palestinian prisoners, per media reports.
Israeli officials say 48 hostages are still in Gaza, including 20 who are believed to be alive, per CBS News.
Hamas will begin releasing Israeli hostages held in Gaza on Monday morning, one of its top officials said, before Trump chairs the international summit in Egypt on his peace plan; Israel has already begun transferring Palestinian prisoners to two jails before their release, according to media reports.
Under the agreement outlined by Trump, Israel will also allow the immediate provision of "full aid" to Gaza, which has faced severe food shortages and has fallen into famine in some regions.
BBC reported Sunday that dozens of aid trucks have begun entering Gaza this morning, with pictures showing queues of lorries at the Rafah crossing with Egypt. The UN has planned to deliver 170,000 metric tons of food, medicine and other supplies in the next two months, increase fuel distribution, and restart bakeries, community kitchens and water systems, per the Washington Post on Saturday.
However, aid officials cautioned that the degree of civilian suffering and the continued presence of Israeli troops in about half of Gaza, combined with enduring Israeli limitations on many major international aid organizations, could complicate their ability to bring relief to the population.
While the ceasefire deal appeared to be holding, experts cautioned that the upcoming negotiations will be extremely challenging, as the first phase only addressed a few issues, leaving the critical ones for the second phase.
For immediate issues needing urgent resolution, the next phase will have to address the disarmament of Hamas, the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and an end to hostilities. On these sticking points, however, Hamas and Israel hold sharply opposing stances with no signs of compromise, Niu Xinchun, executive director of the China-Arab Research Institute of Ningxia University, told the Global Times on Sunday.
A Hamas official appeared to reject a key element of Trump's peace plan for Gaza, saying the group would not agree to disarm. "The proposed weapons handover is out of the question and not negotiable," the official told the AFP news agency on Saturday.
On another sticking point of Hamas' demand for Israel to withdraw all its forces from Gaza, Israel's military has said it will continue to operate defensively from the roughly 50 percent of the enclave it still controls after pulling back to the agreed-upon lines, per AFP.
For longer-term concerns, Niu said the issues related to post-war transition and reconstruction are even harder to address.
According to Reuters, the next phase of Trump's plan calls for an international body - the "Board of Peace" - to play a role in Gaza's post-war administration. The plan calls for Trump to lead it and includes former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. In response, Hamas issued a statement late Friday rejecting what it called any "foreign guardianship," adding that governance of Gaza was purely an internal Palestinian matter.
Gaza Summit: symbolic or breakthrough?
Trump will reportedly visit Israel on Monday to mark the ceasefire and hostage deal, delivering an address to the Knesset, Israel's parliament. Then, he is also expected to chair a summit in Egypt later in the day, CBS News reported.
The meeting will involve leaders from more than 20 countries, the Egyptian presidency said in a statement on Saturday. It will aim "to end the war in the Gaza Strip, enhance efforts to achieve peace and stability in the Middle East, and usher in a new era of regional security and stability," the statement said.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have confirmed their attendance, along with Italy's Giorgia Meloni and Pedro Sanchez of Spain, per Al Jazeera.
Neither Israeli nor the Hamas Palestinian group will attend the event, according to a report by the Times of Israel.
Tang Zhichao, director of the Centre of Development and Governance in the Middle East at the Institute of West Asian and African Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, believes Trump's attendance of the summit is largely symbolic, aimed at showcasing his achievements for the Gaza ceasefire.
The US president's attendance also aims to pressure Israel and Hamas to implement the deal while demonstrating American influence to Arab nations, Tang told the Global Times on Sunday.
Echoing Tang, director of the Center for Afghanistan Studies at Lanzhou University Zhu Yongbiao said the US is trying to bolster its influence in the Middle East and help restore its regional dominance by facilitating the agreements.
Niu believes the summit will also advance second-phase negotiations of the peace deal, and to build international consensus. Moreover, the US is seeking to unify global solutions on Gaza and merge the differing paths into one under American leadership, Niu said.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Friday outlined China's positions on the first-phase ceasefire and prisoner swap agreement reached between Israel and Hamas, during a joint press conference with Swiss Federal Councillor and Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis.
Wang, also a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, called on the international community to work together to achieve a genuine, comprehensive and lasting ceasefire, effectively alleviate the humanitarian crisis, and restore stability in the region, Wang said, Xinhua News Agency reported.
The Chinese top diplomat stressed that the principle of "the Palestinians governing Palestine" must be upheld, and any arrangements regarding Gaza's future should respect the will of the Palestinian people. He also said the long-term direction of the two-state solution must remain unwavering to achieve lasting peaceful coexistence between Israel and Palestine.
Gaza summit to take place in Egypt amid aid delivery, hostage-prisoner swap
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