Hamas says it has exchanged a list of names of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners to be released in a swap deal, as key figures arrive in Egypt for a third day of peace talks between the group and Israel. Listen to The World podcast as you scroll.
Wednesday 8 October 2025 11:15, UK
Turkey’s president has once more weighed in on the negotiations, saying that Israel remains the main obstacle to peace.
“Peace is not a bird with a single wing. Putting the entire burden of peace on Hamas and Palestinians is not a fair, correct or realistic approach,” he said, speaking to lawmakers from his Justice and Development Party.
Israel must stop its bombardment of Gaza, he added.
Israel has only halted “certain bombings” despite calls from Donald Trump to halt strikes entirely as required by his peace plan.
Earlier today, Erdogan told journalists on a flight from Azerbaijan to Turkey that his government was talking to Hamas at Trump’s behest, to convince them of the best approach to the future of the Palestinian territories (see our post at 9.38am).
Protesters gathered in several countries yesterday to condemn the war in Gaza as Israelis marked the second anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 attack.
The massacre, in which 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage, sparked a retaliatory Israeli military campaign in Gaza, which has claimed more than 67,000 Palestinian lives, according to health authorities.
Scroll to see images from protests in Indonesia, Japan, Bolivia, Brazil, Argentina and Mexico…
Candlelit vigils will take place in four major UK cities this evening to mark two years since the October 7 attacks.
The Palestinian Forum in Britain says the vigils will get underway from 6pm in Whitehall, central London, as well as in Manchester, Newcastle and Edinburgh.
It has called on Palestinians, Arabs and “all supporters of human rights and justice” to attend the events, which it says will honour “the tens of thousands of martyrs” who have been killed in Gaza.
It comes after hundreds of students joined pro-Palestinian rallies at universities in London, Sheffield and Edinburgh yesterday, despite calls from Sir Keir Starmer not to protest.
A candlelit vigil was held in Germany’s capital Berlin yesterday to mark the anniversary.
Attendees held Israeli flags and a display on the Brandenburg Gate called for Hamas to return the remaining hostages.
Israel’s controversial national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has made a provocative appearance at the flashpoint Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem this morning.
“I only pray that our prime minister will allow a complete victory in Gaza as well – to destroy Hamas,” said Ben-Gvir in a video shot right by the mosque on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.
“With God’s help we will return the hostages, and we will win a complete victory,” he added.
The Al-Aqsa compound is a holy site in both Islam and Judaism, but currently administered by a Muslim foundation. Under the arrangement, Jews can visit the mosque but may not pray there – a rule that Ben-Gvir has publicly flouted before.
He is one of the far-right hardliners whose support the coalition government of Benjamin Netanyahu depends on.
Both Ben-Gvir and the far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, have publicly distanced themselves from Netanyahu’s efforts to implement Donald Trump’s peace plan.
Ben-Gvir has threatened to quit the government unless Hamas is utterly destroyed.
Abdel Fattah al Sisi is the latest official to join in on the cautious optimism surrounding the first days of Gaza peace talks in his country.
Egypt’s president says he is hearing “very encouraging things” from the negotiations, taking place behind closed doors since Monday.
Yesterday, Israeli media reported that Benjamin Netanyahu’s office had expressed “optimism” about the talks. Donald Trump said that negotiations over his peace plan were “serious”.
Yesterday marked the second anniversary of both Hamas’s attack on Israel and the start of a war that has since reduced much of Gaza to rubble.
Sky News has spoken to people on the ground, who share how they have experienced the last two years.
Watch first-hand accounts of the “completely different life” in Gaza in the video below…
Another update from Turkey is rolling in: The Turkish president says that his government is talking to Hamas to explain the best approach for the future of the Palestinian territories to them.
Speaking to reporters on a flight back from Azerbaijan, Recep Tayyip Erdogan says that Donald Trump has asked him to talk to the group and convince them of US peace efforts.
Turkish officials are also involved in negotiations in Egypt, he says.
The president adds that Gaza must ultimately remain Palestinian and Palestinians must govern Gaza.
He added that the deployment of foreign forces to Gaza should be discussed in detail, and that Turkey is ready to contribute to all efforts.
Our international correspondent Alex Rossi has provided an update on the progress of the Gaza peace talks taking place in Egypt.
“There’s been two days of talks so far. Monday I think it was all a bit stuck, all a bit hostile and hard going, from what I understand,” he says.
“Yesterday it seemed to move much better, so the general mood music at the moment is quite good from the actors actually in Sharm el Sheikh.”
Watch Rossi’s report below…
Hamas has just released a statement with an update on the Gaza peace talks.
It says that Israel and Hamas negotiators have exchanged lists of prisoners and hostages who would be released in case of a deal.
The statement signed by senior Hamas official Taher al Nunu also expresses optimism about reaching a deal.
Al Nunu reiterates that negotiations are focussed on the “mechanisms for implementing the end of the war, the withdrawal of the occupation forces from the Gaza Strip, and the exchange of prisoners”.
The release of the remaining Hamas-held hostages and of 1,950 Palestinian prisoners are key parts of Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan – see that proposal in full in our 8.25 post.
However, the timing of the implementation of the first phase of Trump’s plan has not yet been agreed, a Palestinian source close to the negotiations says.
Donald Trump himself once more weighed in from the sidelines as negotiators are seeking to implement his peace plan.
It’s a huge prestige project for Trump, who is infamously eyeing the Nobel Peace Prize – this year’s winner is announced on Friday.
During an Oval Office meeting with Canada’s Mark Carney last night, the US president described the state of the negotiations as “very serious”.
“I think there’s a possibility we could have peace in the Middle East,” he added.
Read the full recap of yesterday’s events below:
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