Israel has approved a deal with Hamas in which 50 hostages held by the terrorist group will be released in exchange for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza lasting at least four days and the release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
The deal brokered by Qatar was approved by the Israeli Cabinet early Wednesday morning local time after more than six hours of debate – marking the first major diplomatic breakthrough since the start of the war.
“The Israeli government is committed to bringing home all the hostages,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “Tonight, the government approved the outline for the first stage of achieving this goal.”
Qatar’s foreign affairs ministry later formally announced the deal in a statement on X and said the start time for a ceasefire would be revealed “within the next 24 hours.”
As part of the deal – struck more than six weeks into the war – Hamas is set to release 50 of the 240 hostages taken during the October 7 attack on the Jewish state, according to the Israeli government.
The first hostages to be released were women and children.
Israel and Hamas reached a tentative deal to free hostages from Gaza on Tuesday, reports said.REUTERS
The hostages will be released during a four-day ceasefire in Gaza, which has been shattered by Israeli counter-airstrikes and subsequent ground attacks aimed at destroying Hamas.
The pause in fighting will extend an extra day for every 10 additional hostages released by Hamas, the Israeli government said.
Three Americans could be among the hostages released under the deal, the official said.
Protest outside the UNICEF office in Tel Aviv to demand the release of the Israeli hostages. AFP via Getty Images
President Biden said he welcomed “an agreement to secure the release of hostages taken by the terrorist group Hamas” in a statement Tuesday night.
“Today’s agreement should bring home additional American hostages, and I will not stop until they are all freed,” Biden said.
“I look forward to speaking with each of these leaders and staying in close contact as we work to ensure that this agreement is fully implemented. It is important that all aspects of this agreement are fully implemented,” the president added.
US officials said they hoped Abigail Mor Idan, a 3-year-old American girl whose parents were killed on October 7, would be among the children included in the talks.
“For our family, we’ve spent the last seven weeks … worrying, wondering, praying, hoping,” Idan’s aunt, Liz Hirsh Naftali, told CNN Tuesday night.
Ten Americans are still unaccounted for, including the child and two women, CNN reported.
Along with the temporary ceasefire, Israel will release “a number of Palestinian women and children” imprisoned in the country, according to Qatar’s foreign affairs ministry.
“The number of those released will be increased at the implementation stage of the agreement,” said the ministry in its statement.
The Palestinian terrorist group Hamas took about 240 hostages on Oct. 7. ABIR SULTAN/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
Hamas said in a statement early Wednesday that 150 women and children imprisoned in Israeli prisons would be released.
Israel also agreed to allow more fuel into Gaza and a large amount of humanitarian aid, including medical supplies, Hamas said in a recent statement.
Netanyahu vowed the Jewish state would resume its attacks on Hamas once the temporary ceasefire ends.
Israel is expected to agree to a several-day pause in the war in Gaza. via REUTERS Israeli forces are operating in the Gaza Strip. via REUTERS
“We are at war and we will continue the war until we achieve all our goals,” Netanyahu said in a recorded message at the start of the latest government meeting. “To destroy Hamas, return all our hostages and ensure that no entity in Gaza can threaten Israel.”
Intelligence efforts will continue even during the break so that troops are ready when fighting resumes, he said.
Ahead of the hostage negotiations, the Israeli army moved the Palestinians arrested on Tuesday out of the Gaza Strip.
It is not clear whether those transferred may be among the prisoners released in the hostage negotiations.
The reported deal is designed to create the first major lull in a war that has killed more than 1,200 people in the Jewish state and more than 11,500 others are reported in Gaza.AFP via Getty Images
The reported deal is designed to create the first major lull in a war that has killed more than 1,200 people in the Jewish state and more than 11,500 others were reported in Gaza, an unprecedented loss of life in the decades-long conflict between Israel and Palestine.
It will provide relief to those taking refuge in Gaza after Israel began an all-out bombardment and ground attack on Palestinian enclaves, closing hospitals and evacuating civilians to the south.
On Monday, wounded Palestinians were transferred from a struggling Indonesian hospital to Nasser hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis.
The ceasefire agreement is likely to be coordinated with further evacuations from northern Gaza, which holds several Hamas headquarters, along with more aid trucks to be received by hospitals.
Four hostages have been released so far, including a mother and daughter with dual American and Israeli citizenship and two elderly Israeli women.
The Israeli army rescued an Israeli soldier in late October after he was kidnapped from his military base.
With Postal wire
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
