Qatar says ‘momentum’ building back up in Gaza ceasefire efforts

Qatar’s top diplomat says his country is ‘engaging’ over past weeks in renewed push to end Israel’s Gaza war.

A month after suspending its mediation bid, Qatar has said it sees “momentum” in efforts to reach a deal to end Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip, as dozens of Palestinians were killed in the Israeli military’s continued attacks on the besieged enclave.

Speaking at the Doha Forum on Saturday, Qatari Foreign Minister and Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said the country took a step back from mediating Gaza ceasefire talks because it failed to see “a real willingness” to end the war.

But the minister said that after the United States presidential election on November 5, Qatar has sensed “that the momentum is coming back”.

“We have seen a lot of encouragement from the incoming administration [of US President-elect Donald Trump] in order to achieve a deal even before the president comes [into] office” in January, Al Thani said.

“And that actually made us [try] … to put it back on track. We’ve been engaging in the past couple of weeks,” he added.