The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) responded to the Egyptian paper regarding the truce in the Gaza Strip, as two high-ranking Egyptian sources confirmed to Xinhua News Agency today (Saturday).

The two sources said that Egypt received notification from Hamas that a delegation from the movement was heading to Cairo today (Saturday) with the intention of concluding and implementing a truce agreement with Israel.

The two sources explained that Hamas responded to the initiative proposed by Egypt, after providing guarantees that the war in Gaza could be stopped.

The two sources pointed out that Egypt exerted great pressure on both sides of the conflict to respond to the Egyptian paper, and noted that Cairo warned Hamas of the escalation of the war in the Gaza Strip if an agreement was not reached.

The two sources pointed out that the United States of America is in great contact with Cairo regarding concluding a truce deal between Hamas and Israel.

Reports said that CIA Director William Burns had already arrived in Egypt as part of the tripartite guarantees of the deal, which included Egypt, the United States, and Qatar.

The Egyptian initiative includes three stages, and aims to exchange detainees and prisoners between Hamas and Israel, and return to sustainable calm, including taking the necessary measures to reach a ceasefire.

The duration of the first phase is 40 days, and stipulates the temporary cessation of mutual military operations between the two parties, the exchange of detainees and prisoners between the two sides, and the return of displaced civilians to their areas of residence in the Gaza Strip.

It also provides for facilitating the entry of intensive and appropriate quantities of humanitarian aid, relief materials and fuel, including the fuel needed to operate the power station, and the equipment needed to remove rubble and rehabilitate and operate hospitals, health centers and bakeries in the Gaza Strip.

It also includes facilitating the entry of supplies and requirements necessary to establish shelter camps to accommodate displaced persons who lost their homes during the war.

A Hamas delegation held talks in Cairo last Monday, then left to study the latest proposals.

An Egyptian source told the Egyptian satellite channel Cairo News at the time that the Hamas delegation would return again with a written response to the truce deal proposal.

The Egyptian and Qatari mediators, in addition to the United States, are seeking to reach a prisoner exchange deal and a second truce between Israel and Hamas after the first, which lasted a week until the beginning of last December.

Israel estimates that there are about 134 Israeli detainees in Gaza, at a time when Hamas announced that 70 of them were killed in random Israeli raids.

Israel holds more than 9,000 Palestinian prisoners in its prisons, whose conditions have worsened since it began its war on Gaza, and a number of them have died, according to Palestinian organizations concerned with prisoners.