00:00 For more, we can speak to our foreign editor, Philip Turrell. Hello to you, Philip. America's
00:05 CIA director and the head of Israel's Mossad agency. In Doha for talks on the pauses, also
00:12 on hostage release efforts. What's the latest to come out of that?
00:17 Right. Well, you're right. And I think we can safely say that negotiations are going on behind
00:21 the scenes. We don't know exactly what is going on there because they're being kept secret. But
00:26 there are three kingmakers in this, the Israelis, the Americans and the Qataris who are in contact
00:31 with Hamas. And that is why we've seen this action, this movement over the past 24 hours,
00:36 first of all, concerning these two hostages behind. They're neither held by Hamas. They're
00:44 being held by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. They are part of a small group of hostages that were
00:49 also taken. But there is obviously some kind of negotiation going on behind the scenes to get
00:54 them released. They haven't been so yet. But from what we're being told, when appropriate measures
01:00 are met, that's what the Islamic Jihad are saying, those hostages will be released. That leads one to
01:05 believe maybe they're trying to negotiate a prisoner release by Israel, which is something
01:10 that Israel, of course, has fundamentally refused to do right now. But we have William Burns of the
01:15 CIA and David Barnea of Mossad, who have been in Doha talking to the authorities there. They are
01:26 obviously trying to negotiate two things. The first one is the release of hostages. And the second
01:30 thing is these humanitarian pauses. So let's start with the humanitarian pauses. What has been
01:37 agreed, this is not a ceasefire. This is not any kind of humanitarian pause, which is what much of
01:45 the globe has been calling for and what was the subject of the meeting in Paris yesterday with
01:51 many delegations from around the world, about 80 delegations, and a pledge of over a billion
01:57 dollars worth of aid for Gaza, but calls again for this humanitarian pause. This is not that.
02:03 What we're talking about here is a four-hour pause every day with a three-hour notice period
02:10 ahead of time to let people get out of northern Gaza and move southwards by two roads that the
02:16 Israeli authorities are using for that. And at the same time, they're saying to these people,
02:20 you can get out of northern Gaza. We will give you the time to do that. We'll also give you time
02:25 to go out and find food if you can from shops that are selling it, if there is any food in
02:30 those shops and if those shops are open. But it doesn't mean that humanitarian aid is coming into
02:34 northern Gaza. It's a chance for the population there to go to southern Gaza where they're
02:39 supposed to be safer. But even so, we're not sure they're going to be safer there. So that's
02:43 what is being negotiated at the moment. It appears there is some kind of breakthrough there.
02:47 And these humanitarian, well, these pauses will start taking place from today onwards.
02:54 So what about reports about possible three-day pauses?
02:58 So that's another issue that is being discussed. And this is something that
03:02 William Burns, sorry, not William Burns, but John Kirby, the White House, the US White House
03:07 spokesperson, has been talking about. And this is something that is being negotiated by Egyptian
03:15 officials, the UN, a Western diplomat. They're talking about three-day pauses. What does that
03:19 mean? Well, that means that there will be three-day ceasefire, if you like, not a long-term
03:25 ceasefire, but a three-day ceasefire in return for the release of up to 12 hostages. That is still
03:34 being discussed and still being negotiated. And it appears that seven of those hostages,
03:39 well, between six and seven will be American. These are hostages being held by Hamas.
03:45 We haven't got a breakthrough on that yet, but that's also something that
03:49 appears to be being discussed right now. So to be absolutely clear, we're no closer to
03:54 Israel agreeing on a cessation of the bombing raids in the Gaza Strip. Israel has said it will
04:00 only stop those once all the hostages have been released. Hamas has said it will only release
04:05 the hostages once Israel frees all these Palestinian prisoners from jails. So we're
04:09 no closer on that. But this is a sign that there's a lot of negotiation taking place behind the scenes.
04:15 And little by little, there are some cracks of light that are beginning to show.
04:19 All right, Philip. Thank you very much, Philip Turrell, our foreign editor.
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