“With Hamas, nothing is certain and everything can change”, a source from the Israeli Government tells La Vanguardia. The army insists on the same idea and calls for caution. Everything is ready for today, finally, to begin the cease-fire in Gaza agreed between Israel and Hamas, and to release the first thirteen hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. But also everything was ready yesterday and in the end the truce did not start and the fighting in the strip continued. Israel blames Hamas for demanding new demands that were not in the original agreement; and Hamas blames Israel for the delay due to disagreements in the logistics of the exchange of prisoners for hostages.
However, if nothing goes wrong, the ceasefire would begin at seven in the morning today (one hour less in Spain). After the cessation of hostilities, the first of the four hostage deliveries by Hamas would arrive, scheduled for four in the afternoon (local time), when thirteen hostages would be released from the nearly 240 held by the Islamist group and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad – about 30 – since the terrorist attack of October 7. These schedules were announced yesterday by the Government of Qatar, which acts as a mediator in the conflict – with the support of the US – and hosts the leaders of the fundamentalist organization in its territory. The Israeli Government confirmed it.
Israel also reported that it has in its hands the list – delivered to Doha by Qatar to the head of the Mossad, the foreign secret service – with the names of the 50 hostages that will be released by Hamas during the four days that the truce is expected to last at least . The names will not be made public until those released are out of danger in Israeli territory.
The agreement reached on Tuesday indicates that Hamas will release 10 to 13 hostages each day of the four days of the truce, which may extend to ten days if the fundamentalist organization continues to release hostages. The first 50 will be women and children, but it is not yet known if this group includes all minors, about 40.
The first thirteen hostages would be handed over today to the Red Cross – whose president, Mirjana Spolijaric, met Monday in Qatar with the leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh – and would leave Gaza for Egypt through the border crossing of Rafah, city which was bombarded by Israel yesterday. “There will be thirteen women and children, and if there were captives from the same family they will all be released together in this first batch,” said the spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Qatar, Majed Al-Ansari, yesterday.
At the same time, Israel should release 150 Palestinian prisoners from a list of 300 – women and teenagers without blood crimes – that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Government has already sent to the Supreme Court. The first 39 prisoners would be released this Friday and the rest would be released gradually over the course of the four days of the truce. Likewise, if the ceasefire continued, Israel would continue to release prisoners as Hamas released more hostages.
Trucks with humanitarian aid in the form of food, fuel and medical and logistical material were waiting last night on the Egyptian side of Rafah for the start of the ceasefire. The agreement between Israel and Hamas also involves the entry of humanitarian aid, as well as the fact that the hostages who remain in the hands of the Islamist group can be visited and cared for by Red Cross personnel.
Although Qatar has already stated that it continues to try to achieve a definitive ceasefire, Israel has reiterated that the war will not stop until Hamas is eliminated from Gaza. The Israeli Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, said yesterday that “this respite will be brief”. The truce will come to the strip when Israel has already killed more than 14,100 Palestinians, including more than 5,000 minors, since it began its invasion a little over a month ago.
As the truce did not start yesterday, fighting and shelling continued throughout the strip. Hamas reported that around 30 Gazans had died yesterday in the Israeli attack on a United Nations school in the Jabalia refugee camp.
Meanwhile, troops detained yesterday the director of Al-Xifa hospital in Gaza City, Mohamed Abu Salmeia, to be questioned for his alleged collaboration with the “terrorist activities” that Hamas allegedly carried out in the center sanitary, as the army maintains. According to a military spokesman, Abu Salmeia was “transferred for questioning by the domestic intelligence service (Shin Bet), based on evidence showing that the Al-Xifa hospital, under his direction, served as a Hamas command and control center”.
And meanwhile, in the north, there was no truce either, although Hizbullah had hinted that it would add to the ceasefire. The Shia guerrillas of Lebanon launched fifty projectiles on northern Israel yesterday, the worst attack since the outbreak of the conflict on October 7.
