If nothing goes wrong, the ceasefire in Gaza would finally begin this Friday at 7 in the morning (one hour less in Spain). After the suspension of fighting, the first of the four hostage deliveries by Hamas would arrive, scheduled for 4 in the afternoon (local time), when thirteen kidnapped people of the nearly 240 held by the Islamist group would be released. since its October 7 terrorist attack. These schedules were reported this Thursday by the government of Qatar, which acts as a mediator in the conflict and houses the leaders of the fundamentalist organization.
The Israeli government has confirmed these times to the press and, therefore, that the ceasefire is scheduled to begin tomorrow. However, Executive sources told La Vanguardia that “with Hamas nothing is certain and everything can change.” This is what happened this Thursday, when the start of the truce was announced, but at the stroke of midnight (Spanish time) a statement from the director of the National Security Council, Tzachi Hanegi, indicated that “the start of the liberations will take place according to the original agreement between the parties, and not before Friday.” Later, late in the morning in Israel, official sources consulted leaked to the local press that the fighting would continue this Thursday and there would be no truce.
Israel also reported this Thursday that it has in its possession the list of the 50 hostages who will be released by Hamas in the four days that, at least, the truce is expected to last. The government asked the media to be cautious when disseminating the names of those kidnapped on that list, who have not officially been made public. The agreement reached on Tuesday between both contenders indicates that Hamas will release 10 to 13 hostages each day of the four days that the truce lasts, which may be extended up to ten days if the fundamentalist organization continues handing over kidnapped people. The first 50 will be women and children, but it is not yet known if all the minors, who number around 40, will be released.
The first thirteen hostages who would be handed over to the Red Cross tomorrow and would leave Gaza for Egypt through the Rafah border crossing, will be women and children, as confirmed by the spokesman for the Qatari Foreign Ministry, Majed Al Ansari.
“There will be thirteen women and children, and if there are captives from the same family they will be released all together within this first batch,” declared Al Ansari in Doha.
At the same time, as part of the agreement, Israel should release 150 Palestinian prisoners from a list of 300 – women and adolescents without blood crimes – that Prime Minister Beniamin Netanyahu’s government has already sent to the Supreme Court. This Friday the first 39 prisoners would be released and the rest would be released during the four days of the truce. Likewise, if the ceasefire continued, Israel would continue to release prisoners as Hamas released more hostages.
The list of the 50 people that Hamas would release during the four days of truce was received in Doha by the director of Mossad, the Israeli foreign intelligence service, David Barnea, from the Qatari mediators.
The agreement between Israel and Hamas implies the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza in the form of food, medical supplies and fuel, which will reach the strip through the Rafah crossing in the south, bordering Egypt, where the migrants are expected to leave. kidnapped after being handed over to the Red Cross.
It is also expected that the hostages who remain in the hands of Hamas can be visited and medically assisted by the Red Cross, as Netanyahu confirmed on Wednesday during a press conference in which he thanked US President Joe Biden for his help. “diplomatic” to achieve this agreement. As he had already reiterated on Tuesday when the deal was considered imminent, Netanyahu insisted that Israel intends to exert “maximum pressure” against Hamas. “I want to be clear, the war continues,” he said. “We will continue fighting until we achieve absolute victory” over Hamas, Netanyahu insisted.
But, above all, the release of the hostages has been possible thanks to the Government of Qatar, where the Hamas leaders reside. The main Qatari negotiator, diplomat Mohamed bin Abdulaziz al Julaifi, explained on CNN some details of the talks, which lasted several weeks, and said that Israel’s attack on the Al Shifa hospital delayed the agreement between parties that “do not have no level of trust between each other.”
“Our work was extremely intense,” he said. “This is a period of great tension, military clashes, humanitarian escalation and ground invasion,” added Al Julaifi. The diplomat assured that Qatar’s objective, beyond this truce, is to achieve “a permanent ceasefire, stop the bloodshed and improve the lives of the Palestinian people.”
The agreement was approved in a marathon and hectic meeting of the Israeli Council of Ministers, which lasted almost eight hours and continued until around four in the morning on Wednesday. Once again, the most far-right sector of the Netanyahu Government, led by The head of the Security portfolio, Itamar Ben Gvir, tried to boycott the consensus. Finally, the three ministers of the Otsma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party were the only ones in the Cabinet who voted against the deal with Hamas. Subsequently, Ben Gvir expressed his “displeasure” in X for an agreement that he described as a “dangerous precedent.”
However, the other far-right party in the Executive, Religious Zionism, led by the Minister of Finance, Bezalel Smotrich, did vote in favor of granting the truce and releasing Palestinian prisoners who did not have blood crimes, despite the fact that before the meeting had taken a stand against it. Smotrich explained that his change of position was due to having received assurances that “the Government, the [war] cabinet and the entire defense system were unreservedly committed to continuing the war until the destruction of Hamas.” Smotrich added in a statement that “the repatriation of the hostages will contribute to achieving the objectives of the war.”
