'We've seen a lot of encouragement': Qatar says it's engaging with Trump team on Gaza ceasefire

Qatar is engaging with the incoming Trump administration on Gaza after sensing fresh momentum for ceasefire talks following the US election, Qatar's Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said on Saturday.

The war in Gaza has been raging for over 14 months, with much of the tiny enclave laid to waste and more than 44,000 Palestinians killed, the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry reports without distinguishing between combatants and civilians, as Israeli forces continue their drive to wipe out Hamas and recapture hostages taken by the terror group.

Donald Trump's Middle East envoy pick Steve Witkoff has traveled to Qatar and Israel to kick-start the US president-elect's diplomatic push for a ceasefire and hostage release deal before his inauguration on Jan. 20, a source briefed on the talks told Reuters on Thursday.

'We have seen a lot of encouragement'

"We have seen a lot of encouragement from the incoming administration in order to achieve a deal even before the President comes to office, and that's actually made us [try] to move things back and [try] to put it back on track, and we've been engaging in the past couple of weeks," Al Thani said at a conference in Doha.

Witkoff, who will officially take up the envoy position in Trump's administration, met separately in late November with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Al Thani, the source said.

Trump returned to the world stage on Saturday to join leaders for the reopening of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. However, it was unclear whether he would meet other leaders apart from French President Emmanuel Macron.

Meanwhile, Hamas is attempting to determine the number of living Israeli hostages it and other terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip are holding, Palestinian sources told Saudi-owned news outlet Asharq Al-Awsat on Saturday.

The sources told the media outlet that Hamas leadership reached out to other groups to assess the number of live hostages.

The report comes as sources told the Hezbollah-affiliated Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar that hostage deal negotiations have been reported to enter a new and “final” phase.

An Egyptian source told the Lebanese outlet that “several points are still pending” regarding the plan for Gaza after the war ends, specifically managing and rebuilding the Gaza Strip.

Ongoing contact with the Qataris has taken a positive turn in the past two days, Al-Akhbar added.

Additional topics that are reportedly on the table in negotiations are the IDF’s presence in the Gaza Strip and the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.

In other efforts on the hostage issue, President Isaac Herzog spoke with billionaire X/Twitter owner and incoming US efficiency czar Elon Musk about pushing forward a deal at the behest of the families of the remaining captives, sources familiar with the conversation told The Financial Times on Friday.

The conversation was part of a push to “pressure wherever pressure can be placed to keep the issue” of the hostages in mind, the familiar party claimed.