Actor and director Justin Baldoni has hit back at Blake Lively, his co-star in the film It Ends With Us, by filing a lawsuit against her and her husband Ryan Reynolds.

It comes after Lively filed a legal complaint against Baldoni in December, alleging sexual harassment and that he had campaigned to “destroy” her reputation.

Now, Baldoni has responded by suing for $400m (£326m) damages on claims of civil extortion, defamation and invasion of privacy.

In response, Lively’s legal team described the lawsuit as “another chapter in the abuser playbook”.

In the latest step in their bitter legal battle, lawyers for Baldoni, 40, has claimed Lively and her team made a “duplicitous attempt to destroy” him.

His attorney Bryan Freedman said the actress and her partners had disseminated “grossly edited, unsubstantiated, new and doctored information to the media”.

He also said Lively and her team had “attempted to bulldoze reputations and livelihoods for heinously selfish reasons”.

The dispute stems from the production of It Ends With Us, which was adapted from a novel about domestic abuse by Colleen Hoover.

Released last August, the film was a box office success, bringing in more than $350m (£280m) globally.

But it appeared on the press tour that all was not well between the co-stars, who were not pictured on the red carpet together during the premiere in New York, with Baldoni skipping one in London altogether.

Four months after the film’s launch, Lively filed a legal complaint against Baldoni, accusing him and the boss of his production company Wayfarer of sexual harassment plus “other disturbing behaviour” and a “hostile work environment” on set.

Lively’s complaint went further, claiming that Baldoni and his crisis management team had deliberately set out to ruin her reputation online.

Baldoni’s legal team told the BBC at the time the allegations were “categorically false”, and said they hired a crisis manager because Lively had threatened to derail the film unless her demands were met.

Now, Baldoni is alleging in his 179-page complaint that he is not at fault, and that the high-profile battle is “not a case about celebrities sniping at each other in the press”.

“When plaintiffs have their day in court, the jury will recognise that even the most powerful celebrity cannot bend the truth to her will,” it said.

In their response, Lively’s legal team said: “This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim.”

The statement added that Baldoni and Wayfarer were “trying to shift the narrative to Ms Lively by falsely claiming that she seized creative control and alienated the cast from Mr Baldoni”.

“The evidence will show that the cast and others had their own negative experiences with Mr Baldoni and Wayfarer.”

The statement concluded: “The strategy of attacking the woman is desperate, it does not refute the evidence in Ms Lively’s complaint, and it will fail.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has delayed a cabinet vote to approve the Gaza ceasefire deal, due on Thursday, accusing Hamas of seeking last-minute changes to the agreement.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said a “loose end” was being tied up and that he was confident the ceasefire would still begin on Sunday as planned.

Although Israeli negotiators agreed to the deal after months of talks, it cannot be implemented until it is approved by the security cabinet and government.

Hamas said it was committed to the deal, but the BBC understands it was trying to add some of its members to the list of Palestinian prisoners that would be released under the deal.

The delay came after Israeli strikes in Gaza following Wednesday’s announcement of a deal killed more than 80 people, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

A few hours before the Thursday morning meeting was due, Netanyahu accused Hamas of trying to “extort last minute concessions”.

The cabinet would not convene until Hamas accepted “all elements of the agreement,” a statement from his office read.

Blinken said such a delay was to be expected in such a “challenging” situation.

“It’s not exactly surprising that in a process and negotiation that has been this challenging and this fraught, you may get a loose end,” he told a press conference in Washington.

“We’re tying up that loose end as we speak.”

He said the US was “confident” the deal would come into force on Sunday as planned, and that the ceasefire would then persist.

Israeli media reported that the cabinet was expected to meet on Friday to approve the deal and that the alleged issue had been resolved, although this was not officially confirmed.

A majority of Israeli ministers are expected to back the deal, but late on Thursday Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said his right-wing party would quit Netanyahu’s government if it was approved.

“The deal that is taking shape is a reckless deal,” Ben-Gvir told a news conference, adding it would “erase the achievements of the war”.

However, he said his Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party would not seek to topple the government should the deal be ratified.

He urged the leader of the other far-right party in government, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich of the Religious Zionist party, to join him in resigning.

Ohad Tal, the party’s chair in Israel’s parliament, told BBC Radio 4 that it was “debating” whether to leave Netanyahu’s government over the deal.

Meanwhile, a senior Hamas official told the BBC that the group was committed to the agreement announced by the mediators.

The head of Hamas’s delegation, Khalil al-Hayya, officially informed Qatar and Egypt of its approval of all the terms of the agreement, the official told the BBC.

But BBC Gaza correspondent Rushdi Abualouf understands that Hamas was attempting to add the names of one or two symbolic members to the list of prisoners that would be released under the deal.

The first six-week phase of the deal would see 33 hostages – including women, children and elderly people – exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

Israeli troops would also withdraw to the east, away from densely populated areas of Gaza.

Displaced Palestinians would be able to start returning to their homes and hundreds of aid lorries would be allowed entry to the territory each day.

Negotiations for the second phase – which should see the remaining hostages released, a full Israeli troop withdrawal and a return to “sustainable calm” – would start on the 16th day.

The third and final stage would involve the return of any remaining hostages’ bodies and the reconstruction of Gaza – something which could take years.

Israeli air strikes continued after the deal was announced on Wednesday. At least 12 people were killed in Gaza City, where a doctor told the BBC staff “did not rest for one minute” during the “bloody night”.

Strikes were carried out on 50 targets in Gaza since the deal’s announcement, the Israel Defense Forces and the Israeli Security Agency said in a statement.

The prime minister of Qatar – which mediated negotiations – called for “calm” on both sides before the start of the first six-week phase of the ceasefire deal.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas – which is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US and others – in response to an unprecedented cross-border attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 46,788 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population has also been displaced, there is widespread destruction and there are severe shortages of food, fuel, medicine and shelter, while aid agencies struggle to get help to those in need.

Israel says 94 of the hostages are still being held by Hamas, 34 of whom are presumed dead. There are four Israelis who were abducted before the war, two of whom are dead.