On Sunday, Egypt announced “intensive efforts” to reach an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and exchange detainees between Hamas and Israel.

This came during a reception by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi at the Ittihadiya Palace (east of Cairo) with the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, according to a statement by the Egyptian presidency.

The meeting discussed many international and regional issues, with a focus on developments in the situation in the Gaza Strip, according to the statement.

Al-Sisi reviewed "the intensified efforts to reach an immediate ceasefire, exchange detainees, and implement sufficient humanitarian aid to relieve those afflicted in the Gaza Strip, whether by land in coordination with the relevant UN agencies, or through air drops, especially to the areas north of the Gaza Strip."

The Egyptian President appreciated Guterres' positions on the ongoing crisis and his keenness to adhere to the principles of international law and international humanitarian law.

Al-Sisi also appreciated Guterres' continued activity to urge the international community to take action to end the war in Gaza and protect civilians, stressing the need for the Security Council to assume its responsibilities in that regard, according to the same statement.

For his part, Guterres praised the Egyptian efforts to push for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, and Egypt's keenness to keep the Rafah land crossing open continuously over the past months since the start of the current crisis.

He referred to his visit on Saturday to the Rafah crossing, and in this context, he praised what he saw as “a huge Egyptian effort to lead and manage the process of delivering aid to the people of Gaza, despite the severe obstacles and difficulties that this process faces.”

Guterres reiterated "the necessity of a humanitarian ceasefire so that aid can be brought in and distributed effectively to the people of the Gaza Strip."

According to the Egyptian presidency’s statement, “The meeting witnessed a convergence of positions regarding the complete and categorical rejection of the displacement of Palestinians from their lands, and the rejection and warning against any military operation in the Palestinian Rafah.”

On Saturday morning, Guterres arrived in the Egyptian city of Al-Arish, adjacent to the Gaza Strip, on his second visit since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza on October 7.

In Al-Arish, Guterres inspected the wounded Palestinians in the city hospital.

On Friday, Farhan Haq, Guterres’s deputy spokesman, said in a press conference that the latter “will meet with United Nations humanitarian workers on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border, on Saturday, during a multi-country Ramadan solidarity trip,” according to a UN statement.

Haq explained that the Secretary-General of the United Nations "does not intend to go to Gaza."

Guterres will then travel to Jordan, where he will visit the facilities of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), and have a Ramadan breakfast with Palestinian refugees and United Nations employees in the capital, Amman, according to the same source.