White House Middle East envoy Brett McGurk is arriving in the region this week in an attempt to salvage the prisoner swap and ceasefire negotiations in the Gaza Strip, and to ensure that the scheduled talks in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, are held and that the negotiations continue, the Israeli Broadcasting Corporation ("Kan 11") reported on Wednesday evening.

US President Joe Biden will speak with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday evening, in a call joined by US Vice President Kamala Harris, to urge him to show more flexibility on issues related to the border area between Egypt and the Gaza Strip in the ceasefire talks, in reference to the Philadelphia Corridor and the Rafah crossing.

Israeli officials confirmed that "there are gaps between the optimism expressed by American officials and what is happening behind closed doors." The Israeli negotiating team is preparing to participate in the talks in Cairo, despite not reaching understandings regarding the Philadelphi corridor, while the negotiators believe that "more flexibility can be shown on this issue," according to "Kan 11."

The official Israeli channel quoted informed sources on the talks aimed at reaching Israeli-Egyptian-American understandings on the Philadelphia axis, saying that "as long as Israel insists on deploying its forces along the axis, there will be no agreement." The sources stated that "the Israeli options presented behind closed doors relate to reducing forces, but not to repositioning them."

"Unfortunately, we have reached the stage of exchanging accusations, where each side acts as if it aims to show the other side as being responsible for the situation," the sources said. "Kan 11" claimed that the new American proposal, which Washington said Netanyahu had agreed to, includes an Israeli withdrawal from the Philadelphi corridor during the second stage of the possible agreement.

According to senior Israeli officials, Egypt has conveyed a message to Israel that "you have nothing to look for in the corridor; the cross-border tunnels are penetrating far from it." Kan 11 reported that the mediators are frustrated by the deadlock: "The Israeli proposal is a red line for Hamas, and the Hamas proposal is a red line for Israel."

Channel 13, in its evening news bulletin, referred to “anger” on the Egyptian side due to Israel’s withdrawal from understandings regarding the Philadelphi Corridor. Netanyahu’s office responded that “there were no understandings regarding the Philadelphi Corridor, and therefore we did not withdraw from the alleged understandings.” It is worth noting that Al-Araby Al-Jadeed newspaper revealed yesterday that Israel seeks to cancel the “Philadelphi Agreement” signed in 2005 between Egypt and Israel, as well as to introduce amendments to the Camp David Treaty with the aim of legitimizing its control over the Philadelphi Corridor.