An Israeli delegation will travel to Cairo in the coming days for negotiations to reach a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office has said.
"The negotiating team for a hostage deal will depart for Cairo on Saturday night or on Sunday," his office said.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri commented on the announcement saying: "Netanyahu does not want to stop the war and is using these empty statements to cover up his crimes and evade their consequences."
The news comes after Hamas' top leader Ismail Haniyeh was buried in Qatar following his assassination in the Iranian capital Tehran.
Senior officials in the Palestinian militant group and other mourners said their fight against Israel would intensify.
His death was one in a series of killings of senior Hamas figures as the war in Gaza between Hamas and Israel nears its 11th month and concern grows that the conflict is spreading across the Middle East.
Hamas and Iran have both accused Israel of carrying out Mr Haniyeh's killing and have pledged to retaliate against their foe.
Israel has not claimed responsibility for the death nor denied it.
Haniyeh was laid to rest in a cemetery in the city of Lusail after a funeral ceremony at the Iman Mohamed Ibn Abd Al-Wahhab Mosque in Qatar's capital Doha.
His coffin, draped in the Palestinian flag, was carried in a procession past hundreds of people along with the casket of his bodyguard, who was killed in the same attack in Tehran on Wednesday.
Mourners at the ceremony included Khaled Meshaal, who is tipped to be the new Hamas leader.
Other senior Hamas officials and Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani also attended.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said: "Our message to the occupation (Israel) today is that you are sinking deep in the mud and your end is getting closer than ever. The blood of Haniyeh will change all equations."
Khaled Suleiman, who was among the mourners at the mosque, said: "Today we came...to affirm that the resistance will not end with the martyrdom of the leader, and behind the leader comes a new leader."
"God willing, all of us will continue and all of us are on the way to the liberation of Al-Aqsa Mosque (in Jerusalem), Palestine and Gaza, God willing."
Mr Haniyeh was killed by a missile that hit him directly in a state guesthouse in Tehran where he was staying, senior Hamas official Khalil Al-Hayya said in Tehran.
The strike was one of several recent hits that have killed senior figures in Hamas or the Lebanese movement Hezbollah in a conflict that is now stretching from Gaza to the Red Sea and the Lebanon-Israel border and beyond.
In the United States, US President Joe Biden said Haniyeh's killing was not helpful to international efforts to secure a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.
"It doesn't help," Mr Biden told reporters yesterday, when asked if the action ruined the chances of a truce.
Qatar has been leading the peace effort along with Egypt and the United States, Israel's main ally.
Haniyeh seen as a pragmatist
Mr Haniyeh was the face of Hamas' international diplomacy as an Israeli offensive destroyed Gaza.
He was seen by many diplomats as a pragmatist compared to the more hardline members of the Iran-backed group inside Gaza, although some Israeli commentators have said he was considered by some on the Israeli side as an obstacle to a deal.
Three of his sons were killed in an Israeli airstrike in the besieged enclave in April along with four of his grandchildren, Hamas said.
For Palestinian supporters, the Hamas leadership are fighters for liberation from Israeli occupation, keeping their cause alive when international diplomacy has failed them.
To Israelis and Western states, the Iran-backed Hamas, which has directed suicide bombings in Israel and fought frequent wars against it, is a terrorist group bent on Israel's destruction.
Appointed to the Hamas top job in 2017, Mr Haniyeh moved between Turkey and Doha, escaping the travel curbs of the blockaded Gaza Strip.
In May, the International Criminal Court prosecutor's office requested arrest warrants for three Hamas leaders, including Mr Haniyeh, as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes.
Israel and Palestinian leaders have dismissed the allegations.
While Israel has not said it carried out Mr Haniyeh's killing, it has announced that an air strike it mounted last month assassinated Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif in Gaza.
Hamas has not confirmed or denied the death of Mr Deif.
Hezbollah said that its senior military commander Fuad Shukr had been killed in an Israeli strike on a building in Beirut on Tuesday and it vowed a "definite" response to his killing.
Airlines avoiding Middle East airspace
Airlines are avoiding Iranian and Lebanese airspace and cancelling flights to Israel and Lebanon, as concerns grow over a possible conflict in the region after the killing of senior members of militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah this week, according to Reuters.
In a bulletin, OPSGROUP, a membership-based organisation that shares flight risk information, advised traffic between Asia and Europe to avoid Iranian and Iraqi airspace, a day after sources told Reuters that top Iranian officials will meet the representatives of Iran's regional allies from Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen to discuss potential retaliation against Israel.
Many airlines, including US and European airlines, already avoid flying over Iran, especially since the reciprocal missile and drone attacks in April between Iran and Israel.
Singapore Airlines' flight to London Heathrow early today went north of Iran through Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan, rather than crossing through Iran as it did the day before, Flightradar24 showed.
However, a significant number of airlines on Friday were still flying over Iran, including United Arab Emirates carriers Etihad, Emirates and Fly Dubai, as well as Qatar Airways and Turkish Airlines.
Over the past two days, Air India, Germany's Lufthansa Group, US carriers United Airlines and Delta Air, and Italy's ITA Airways said they had suspended flights to Tel Aviv.
Airlines this week have also been cancelling and delaying flights to the Lebanese capital Beirut after a strike in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights last Saturday.
