US official: Gaza ceasefire talks make progress, but work still to be done on "final details"

On August 26th, according to Politico, a senior US official with knowledge of the negotiations in Cairo said that negotiators working to reach a ceasefire agreement in Gaza and the release of Israeli hostages made progress over the weekend. During the talks in Cairo, mediators discussed the "final details" of a potential agreement, including the names of prisoners to be exchanged as part of the agreement. While such progress does not guarantee that a final agreement will be reached soon, negotiators in the Egyptian capital are now discussing the "specifics" of the agreement, the official said. The official also said that the remaining sticking points, while important, are considered to be potentially overcome. The current proposal calls for the withdrawal of Israeli forces from "densely populated areas" of Gaza, the US official said, and the current debate is focused on which parts of the Philadelphia corridor are densely populated and which are non-populated areas, where the IDF would maintain a presence in the first phase of the deal. While Hamas on Sunday reiterated its demand that any deal must include "a permanent ceasefire, complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the free return of residents to their areas, relief and reconstruction, and a serious quid pro quo agreement", the US official said: "Negotiators believe that Hamas may be more flexible about Israel's presence in the first phase of the deal."