John Kirby
John KirbyREUTERS/Jim Bourg

White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on Monday that negotiations in Cairo to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza and a hostage deal are still pressing ahead, Reuters reported.

Speaking in a virtual briefing, Kirby pushed back on suggestions that the talks have broken down, and said that they were "constructive."

"The talks actually progressed to a point where they felt like the next logical step was to have working groups at lower levels to sit down to hammer out these finer details," Kirby was quoted as having said.

Brett McGurk, US President Joe Biden's top Middle East aide at the White House who has been participating in the talks, will soon leave Cairo after staying an extra day to start the working-group talks, Kirby added.

One of the issues to be tackled by the working groups will be the exchange of hostages Hamas is holding and terrorist prisoners in Israel, Kirby said.

Kirby also stated that Israel’s preemptive strike on Hezbollah in Lebanon has not had an impact on the talks.

On Sunday, two Egyptian security sources told Reuters that talks over a possible ceasefire in Gaza and hostage release deal ended without agreement in Cairo.

The sources added that neither Hamas nor Israel had agreed to several compromises presented by mediators.

Later, White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the United States is still “feverishly” working in Cairo toward reaching a deal for a ceasefire in Gaza and a hostage release deal.

Those comments came after Hamas again rejected a proposal for a hostage deal that was presented to it.

Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan told Al-Aqsa TV that "Israel has set new conditions for accepting the agreement and reverted from what it had previously agreed to. Today the delegation informed the mediators of our position. We will not accept any withdrawals from what we agreed to on July 2 or any new demands."

He added that "the US administration is sowing false hopes by talking about an agreement that is close, while this is only for election purposes."