By Zein Khalil
JERUSALEM (AA) - Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid late Tuesday accused the government of sending a delegation to the Cairo negotiations to discuss prisoner swap and cease-fire in Gaza as a "listener."
"It is inconceivable that the Israeli government would come to negotiations in Egypt as only a listener, and refuse to present the position formulated by the professionals for political reasons," Lapid wrote on his X account.
"Above all, it is inconceivable that foreign parties would make a bigger effort than us to free our hostages from the Hamas tunnels," Lapid also said.
The Israeli public broadcaster KAN late Tuesday said the meetings in Cairo joined by representatives from Egypt, Qatar, the US, and Israel ended amid no breakthroughs as Hamas insists on a complete ending of the Israeli war on Gaza, a condition rejected by Israel.
"Hamas's position has not changed, and it still insists on ending the war, which Israel has not accepted," Israel's public broadcaster KAN quoted an unnamed Israeli official as saying, without providing further details.
No official statements have so far been issued by the parties that participated in the Cairo meeting.
The meeting was attended by US CIA Director William Burns, Egyptian intelligence chief Abbas Kamel, and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani.
A Hamas delegation visited the Egyptian capital last week for talks on a possible hostage swap deal with Israel.
Hamas proposed a three-stage plan for a Gaza cease-fire that includes a 135-day pause in the fighting in return for the release of hostages, according to a Palestinian source.
The original framework agreement for a Gaza cease-fire was worked out during a meeting in Paris last month of top officials from the US, Israel, Qatar, and Egypt.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, however, rejected Hamas's offer for a cease-fire and vowed to continue his Gaza war until achieving a “crushing victory” over the Palestinian group.
Israel believes that 134 Israelis are still being held in Gaza after the Israeli army managed on Monday to free two hostages in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.
Since a cross-border incursion by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people, the Israeli offensive into Gaza has killed more than 28,400 people and caused mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
The Israeli war on Gaza has pushed 85% of the territory's population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, which in an interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
*Writing by Ahmed Asmar