Hello and welcome to NewsHour. It's coming to you live from the BBC World Service

Studios in central London. I'm Tim Franks. And we're starting the programme with two wars, two conflicts

that are very familiar, but now two conversations about whether they could both be closer to

ending or at least pausing in some

form. In a little while, we'll be turning to Ukraine in the wake of Donald Trump's whirlwind

diplomacy. But first, Gaza. On Monday, Hamas said that it had accepted a proposal from

Kateri and Egyptian mediators for a 60-day ceasefire.

So the question immediately became, what would Israel's reply be?

Especially given what are widely reported to be the similarities of this proposal

to one that was pushed by the US back in May,

in which Israel indicated at the time, it could sign up to.

In brief, this proposal envisages a 60-day ceasefire

during which half the living hostages, in other words, ten of them,

would be released along with 18 bodies of dead Israelis.

In return, Israel would release almost 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, allow much more aid in,

and pull back its army from several locations inside Gaza.

We've been told that it will be Friday before the Israeli government formally responds,

but before we came on air, we did get through to the government spokesman, David Menser,

who had this to say.

Well, I won't speak directly to the proposal.

I can tell you what our five principles are.

And they're very clear.

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