Doha: The nearly two-month-old ceasefire in the Gaza Strip will not be complete until Israeli troops withdraw from the Palestinian territory under a peace plan backed by Washington and the UN, mediator Qatar's prime minister said Saturday.

"Now we are at the critical moment... A ceasefire cannot be completed unless there is a full withdrawal of the Israeli forces, (and) there is stability back in Gaza," Qatar PM Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani told the Doha Forum, an annual diplomatic conference in the Gulf state's capital.

Qatar, alongside the United States and Egypt, helped secure the long-elusive truce in Gaza, which came into effect on October 10 and has mostly halted two years of fighting between Israel and Hamas.

Under a second phase of the deal, which has yet to begin, I

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