Welcome to the News Hour. President Trump's Middle East envoy today announced that he was bringing his team home from Gaza ceasefire negotiations.

Steve Wickoff blamed Hamas and warned the U.S. and Israel would now pursue, quote, other means to release Israelis still held hostage more than 21 months after the October 7 terrorist attacks. Nick Schifrin's been

following all this and joins us now. So Nick, tell us what do we know about what led to this

decision to walk away from those talks? Earlier today, Israel announced that it would withdraw

its negotiators from Doha to quote for additional consultations in Israel. And this afternoon,

Whitkoff made the announcement

that you just said, saying he too was bringing his team home for additional consultations.

And he used this word. He said, Hamas's latest response, quote, shows a lack of desire to reach a

ceasefire in Gaza. Hamas does not appear to be coordinated or acting in good faith.

But Amna, sources I talk to tonight say that it's not clear that this is the end of negotiations.

A U.S. official tells me that Hamas's latest response demanded that Israel released 200 high-profile

Palestinian prisoners rather than 125, as Israel had offered,

and also adjusted slightly the map, exactly where troops, Israeli troops would go when that

ceasefire began, and that this official says that the mediators, including Qatar and Egypt,

did not see that as major changes and actually thought that the momentum was

positive toward a deal. And there are Israeli officials tonight who are indicating this is actually

just a tactic, a ploy to get Hamas to move back toward the Israeli stance. But there is also that

very clear threat that Whitkoff made in the statement that you read

that we will, quote, pursue other means to release hostages.

That suggests a renewed offensive by Israel in Gaza.

And tonight, Israel is criticizing an announcement just the last few hours by Emmanuel Macron,

the president of France, who said that France

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