Israel, US spy bosses meet over hostages
Israel said on Saturday its spy chief had met with his US counterpart as part of efforts to secure the release of hostages still held in Gaza. "The head of the Mossad, David Barnea, met yesterday (Friday) with the head of the CIA, Bill Burns, as part of the ceaseless efforts to advance another hostage release deal," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement on behalf of the Mossad. The statement came as mediators scrambled to secure a new truce in the five-month-old war in Gaza before Ramadan, the Muslim fasting month which could begin as early as Sunday, depending on the lunar calendar. Israel did not send a delegation to the latest round of truce talks in Cairo, and Hamas left on Thursday after expressing frustration with Israel's positions, heading to Qatar for consultation with the movement's leadership. The Israeli statement did not specify where Friday's meeting between Barnea and Burns took place. "At this stage, Hamas is entrenching its positions like someone who is not interested in a deal and is striving to inflame the region during Ramadan at the expense of Palestinian residents of the Gaza Strip," it said. US President Joe Biden warned this week that, without a truce before Ramadan, "Israel and Jerusalem could be very, very dangerous." The Al-Aqsa mosque compound in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem has been a flashpoint for violence during Ramadan in past years, and on Friday a spokesman for Hamas's armed wing called on "our people" to mobilise and "crawl" towards the site. Netanyahu's government faces enormous domestic political pressure to bring hostages home. Hamas took about 250 people captive in the October 7 attack that triggered the war in Gaza, some of whom were released during a week-long truce in November. Israel believes 99 hostages remain alive in Gaza and that 31 have died. "It should be noted that contacts and cooperation with the mediators are continuing all the time in an attempt to bring a reduction of the differences and advance agreements," Saturday's Israeli statement said. (AFP)