Palestinians fear the crisis in Lebanon is drawing the world's attention away from Gaza, where Israeli attacks this week have killed dozens more, and further dimming prospects for a truce nearly a year after the war that devastated the enclave.
The escalation of conflict between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group over the past two weeks has seen them clash inside Lebanon and fueled fears of a wider regional war.
Both Israel and its Hamas foes say the conflict in Lebanon could help end the conflict in Gaza, but some analysts, mediating officials and citizens of the Palestinian enclave are skeptical.
"The focus is on Lebanon, which means the war in Gaza will not end soon," said Husam Ali, a 45-year-old Gaza resident. He and his family, he told Reuters, have been displaced seven times since the conflict between Israel and Hamas began on October 7 last year.
When Iran fired ballistic missiles at Israel late on Tuesday, which threatened "painful" retaliation, some Gazans welcomed the barrage of missiles as a sign that Tehran was fighting for their cause.
Sami Abu Zuhri, a senior Hamas official, said the prospect of a Gaza ceasefire deal, which would have included the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza and Palestinians jailed by Israel, was remote before the escalation in Lebanon. He said that the regional conflagration could lead to pressure on Israel to reach an agreement in Gaza.
Nothing will happen before the US presidential election is over because no one can effectively pressure Netanyahu, a key obstacle to a Gaza ceasefire deal
But as attention shifts to Lebanon, there is a risk that the war in Gaza could be prolonged, said Ashraf Abuelhul, editor-in-chief of Egypt's state-run Al-Ahram newspaper, which helped broker months of truce talks.
"The most dangerous thing is not that the media attention is going elsewhere, but the fact that now nobody in the world is talking about the agreement or the truce, and this gives Israel a free hand to continue the military offensive and plans in Gaza," he said.
Egypt, which has been alarmed by an Israeli offensive across its border with Gaza and lost billions of dollars in Suez Canal revenue during the war, is frustrated that its mediation efforts have failed, according to Reuters.
"While Israel has been saying since October 7 that military force and pressure on Hamas and Hezbollah will help the hostages return home, we have seen something quite the opposite," said Nomi Bar-Yacov, an expert on Middle East diplomacy at London's Chatham House.
Israel's intensified campaign against Hezbollah "is putting the Gaza ceasefire on the back burner, as the focus is now on trying to destroy as many of Hezbollah's military assets as possible," she said.
An official familiar with the Gaza ceasefire talks told Reuters that nothing would happen before the end of the US presidential election on November 5, "because no one can effectively put pressure on (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu, which is a key obstacle to a deal on truce in Gaza”.
The killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in an Israeli strike last week has complicated the chances of mediation, two Egyptian security sources said. Egypt's efforts have been reduced to preventing any further escalation, the sources said.
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