WASHINGTON – Negotiations to free scores of hostages in Gaza are ongoing, and the U.S. is keeping all options on the table. American officials are playing a significant role in advancing talks between Israel and Hamas, actively formulating plans with international partners for tactical recovery operations.

The U.S., along with Qatar and Egypt, is working to push Israel and Hamas toward a deal to free many of the more than 200 captives Israel believes are being detained, potentially including some of the 10 Americans still unaccounted for following Hamas’ terror attacks on Israel on Oct. 7.

On Friday, President Joe Biden spoke with the emir of Qatar to discuss “the urgent need for all hostages held by Hamas to be released without further delay.” Despite the push for diplomacy, a senior State Department official said on Friday that the U.S. was still unconvinced a deal would be reached.

Multiple sources confirm to ABC News that Israel and Hamas are discussing an arrangement that would exchange at least 50 hostages, mostly women and children, for a multi-day truce as well as the release of an unspecified number of Palestinian women and minors detained by Israel, but that both sides had not reached a consensus on specific details.

In the early days of the conflict, officials said that the circumstances on the ground in Gaza made any kind of targeted attempt to physically extract hostages untenable. While recovery missions always come with inherent danger, the U.S. believes a brokered deal is the best option for securing a large number of the detainees, sources say tactical plans are being developed in case circumstances change.

“There are a few different things that can make hostage takings and recovery negotiations extremely complicated. This hostage situation has all of them,” said Danielle Gilbert, a member of the Bipartisan Commission on Hostage Taking and Wrongful Detention at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and political scientist at Northwestern University.

Families and friends of about 240 hostages held by Hamas in Gaza call for their return as they begin a five-day “March for the Hostages” from Tel Aviv to the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, Nov. 14, 2023.Ohad Zwigenberg/APChristopher O’Leary, the former director of the U.S. task force on hostage recovery, says that the situation is like none other he has experienced through the course of his career, but as it plays out, the U.S. and Israel will likely be able to piece together a more completed intelligence picture that can inform recovery efforts.

“I would be surprised if you didn’t see some form of hostage rescue for some of the members that aren’t getting negotiated out,” he said.

Pressed on the total number of American hostages, national security adviser Jake Sullivan told ABC “This Week” co-anchor Jonathan Karl that America doesn’t have a “precise number.” So far, Hamas has released two American hostages and two Israeli hostages since Oct. 7.