By Maayan Lubell
JERUSALEM (Reuters) -U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff visited Gaza on Wednesday, then met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu amid the Gaza ceasefire and a regional diplomatic push.
Witkoff, whose visit to Gaza was confirmed by a White House official, is in the region to oversee the implementation of the Gaza ceasefire.
U.S. President Donald Trump hopes to leverage that deal into a broader regional accord that would include Saudi Arabia and Israel formalising diplomatic ties. Witkoff visited Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
The U.S. envoy met with Netanyahu alone for more than two hours, an Israeli official said, before they were joined by other ministers.
Netanyahu has long eyed ties with Riyadh and is due to meet Trump in Washington on Feb. 4, when talks for the next phase of the three-stage Gaza ceasefire are meant to formally start.
An Israeli government spokesman and the White House official declined to provide any details on Witkoff’s visit to Gaza, which Israel’s public broadcaster Kan said included an inspection of the Netzarim corridor.
Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have crossed over the route which cuts through Gaza east to west, as they returned to their homes in the northern part of the enclave.
Israel began pulling out of the corridor on Monday and has allowed civilians to return to homes in the north as part of the first six-week phase of the ceasefire, which will also see 33 hostages freed in exchange for almost 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees.
Seven hostages have already been released since the ceasefire took effect on Jan. 19. Three more, including a civilian woman and an elderly man, as well as a female soldier, will be released on Thursday, according to Netanyahu’s office.
Israel will free 110 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, according to the Palestinian prisoners’ Information Office, including 30 minors and 32 prisoners serving life sentences for deadly attacks that killed dozens of Israelis.
Five Thai citizens abducted from Israel during Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack that sparked the Gaza conflict may also be released on Thursday, according to an Israeli official. Some 90 hostages presently remain in Gaza, according to Israeli authorities, 10 of them foreign nationals.
The second stage of the deal, if it is agreed in the negotiations, is meant to open the way to ending the war with the release of all hostages and a full Israeli military withdrawal from Gaza.
Gaza is among the territories Palestinians seek for an independent state. Saudi Arabia has conditioned formal ties with Israel on Palestinian statehood and is unlikely to make progress on this front if the war in Gaza resumes.
In Riyadh, Witkoff also met with Hussein Al-Sheikh, a senior adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the White House official said.
Trump in his first term in office brokered the Abraham Accords in 2020 and led to Israel normalising ties with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
(Additional reporting by Ali Sawafta in Ramallah and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; Editing by James Mackenzie, Alison Williams, Hugh Lawson and Cynthia Osterman)
