The Defense Ministry of the Second Israel-Gazawiz Group and the Release of the Palestinians from the Israeli Prisoners’ Detention under the Time-Delay Agreement
But the second group eventually won out, leading Mr. Netanyahu to hold the vote early Wednesday, setting the stage for a four-day truce and prisoner exchange that could begin this week. A senior defense official in the first group said that the terms that Israel was able to get in the signed deal were better than what existed a week ago.
The group which led the negotiations for Israel argued that the deal was better than none and could go on for a long time, according to four senior security officials.
Majed al-Ansari told reporters that the fighting would cease at 7 a.m. Gaza time on Friday. He said that 13 hostages, along with a number of Palestinian prisoners, will be released starting at 4 pm.
The Israeli prime minister’s office got a list of hostages who would be released and contacted their families. The list didn’t specify how many names were on it.
The war in Gaza began just over a month ago after Hamas launched a massive attack against Israel, killing 1,200 Israelis and abducting around 250 hostages. More than 12,000 people have died in Israel’s attacks on Gaza, according to data from the health ministry.
Netanyahu spoke of the delicate nature of the agreement and how it will be implemented during his Wednesday briefing. The prime minister explained that the ICRC would be allowed to visit the rest of the hostages and provide them with needed medicines under the temporary cease-fire agreement.
The official said Palestinians will be taken by bus to their districts once they are released from Israeli prisons. It was unclear whether they, too, would be set free in stages, but the official said the first would be released before any Israeli hostages.
On the list are 33 women and the remainder are teenage boys aged 14-18. Some have been charged with offenses such as stone-throwing and have been arrested by Israeli forces in recent years. Most are detainees awaiting trial on charges including incitement, stone-throwing and attempted murder. Some are being held in “administrative detention,” a detention without charge or trial.
Hen Avigdori, an Israeli comedy writer whose wife Sharon and 12-year-old daughter Noam are being held in Gaza, said the Israeli army promised to notify him ahead of time if they are slated to be released.
The father of a daughter who is going to be released by Israel was surprised to see her on the list. She was sentenced to 15 years in prison for her conviction for attempting to stab a person. Her father told NPR that her was carrying a knife but not trying to stab anyone.
“My feelings are the feelings of any father. Afghani told NPR that there was celebration and joy. He was against the abduction of Israelis to Gaza, which resulted in the release of his daughter. “We do not agree with any kind of attack against civilians.”
Pope Francis met separately with the relatives of hostages held in Gaza and the families of Palestinians in Israel. “Neither side of the conflict is happy, but the conflict has gone beyond war,” Francis said in a speech after the event. This is not a war; it’s terrorism.
In addition to Israelis and U.S. citizens, foreigners from several other countries are among the people believed to be held by Hamas. Among them are more than 20 Thai farm laborers seized near the Gaza border in the Oct. 7 attack. Fox says she understands that the Thais are not part of the exchange deal.
The cease-fire agreement included an increase in humanitarian aid for Gaza, and on Thursday Hamas said that 200 trucks carryingrelief supplies and four fuel trucks would enter the territory on a daily basis. There was no immediate comment by Israel, which has largely banned fuel from entering Gaza since the war kicked off, saying Hamas would divert it for military purposes.
Israel Continues to Count the Days of the Gaza Strip Campaign During the Fourth and Fourth Day of the Inter–Seattle Agreement
Biden thanked Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani and Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi for help in brokering the deal.
Speaking in Qatar, Al Thani said he hopes the humanitarian truce could provide a framework to “stop the war machine and bloodshed.” El-Sisi said Egypt would continue “efforts made to reach final and sustainable solutions that achieve justice, impose peace, and guarantee the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people.”
The agreement was reached after “many days of difficult and complex negotiations,” Hamas said in a statement. But the militant group that has controlled Gaza since 2007 also cautioned “our hands will remain on the trigger, and our winning battalions will remain in control to defend our people and defeat occupation and aggression.”
Across Israel, the families of some of the roughly 240 people held hostage began to count down the hours, hoping their loved ones might be among those released over the four-day pause.
Shadi Hijazi, a 23-year-old construction worker in Gaza, said that the deal would offer a reprieve from thundering Israeli airstrikes and would allow some Gazans to grieve their losses.
Even as the cease-fire loomed, the Israeli military continued to fight in Gaza on Thursday, said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman, and air-raid sirens warning of incoming rocket fire resounded in some southern Israeli communities.
Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said on Thursday that the takeover of the north of the Gaza Strip was the beginning of a long campaign, days before a cease-fire took effect.
Israel said its warplanes would not fly over southern Gaza for the duration of the cease-fire, and would not fly over the northern part of the territory for six hours each day.
The Red Cross and the Israeli Red Cross in response to the Israeli-Israeli cease-fire agreement on a humanitarian resummation pause
An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Wednesday hostages would be taken to hospitals and the seriously injured would be taken by helicopter. The older hostages will be met by their families at hospitals while the younger ones will be met at the border, an official said.
“Israel should immediately allow for the permanent resumption of sufficient fuel, water and electricity supplies, without which humanitarian needs will continue to deepen,” the Red Cross said.
“Anything that can be done to scale humanitarian aid during this pause should be done,” the ICRC said in a statement later.
But the ICRC’s spokesperson in Jerusalem, Sarah Davies, told NPR that the group was “not made aware of any agreement reached by both parties” related to such visits. “Should visits be agreed upon, the ICRC stands ready” to conduct them, Davies said, adding that the aid group “does not take part in the negotiations between the parties to the conflict.”
The reason for the delay was not immediately clear, but Israel’s Channel 12 quoted an unnamed Israeli political official as saying “The delay isn’t substantive, but technical.”
Around midnight Wednesday and just hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke in a televised, late-evening media briefing where he discussed the agreement, Israel’s National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi said the temporary cease-fire was still on track “according to the original agreement,” but that it wouldn’t occur before Friday.