According to media reports, Israel has received another list of hostage names from the terrorist organization Hamas. G7 countries also called for an extension of the ceasefire.
On Tuesday night, the Islamists released ten Israelis and two foreigners, including a 75-year-old woman whose application for Austrian citizenship is about to be finalized. She was married to an Austrian who has since passed away. A total of 81 hostages were freed during the break in fighting that began on Friday. 61 of them are Israelis, some of whom have other citizenships, and 20 are foreigners. In return, Israel has so far released 180 Palestinian prisoners from its prisons.
The Gulf Emirate of Qatar, Egypt and the US are mediating ceasefire negotiations. According to information from the German Press Agency, the director of the CIA, William Burns, and the head of the Israeli foreign secret service, Mossad, David Barnea, arrived in Doha on Tuesday to speak with the Prime Minister of Qatar, Abdulrahman Al Thani, about the extension of the half. Qatar has good contacts with the organization. Hamas leadership lives in the Gulf Emirate.
As in previous days, Hamas sent another list of hostages to be released on Wednesday, according to media reports. The Times of Israel, citing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, reported that the affected families of the hostages had been notified, but did not provide an exact number. It would be the sixth group of hostages to be freed from Islamist violence during a lull in fighting.
In exchange for the release of the twelve hostages on Tuesday night, Israel released another group of Palestinians from Israeli prisons. All 30 prisoners have been released from various prisons, the Israeli prison authority said. According to this information, there were 15 inmates, some still young, and 15 male minors, the youngest of whom was 14 years old. Palestinian prisoners who have been released so far have been convicted of knife attacks against Israelis, arson and attacks with firebombs or stones.
Before the ceasefire expired, the group of seven economically strong democracies (G-7) spoke out on Wednesday night in favor of an extension of the agreement and called for the release of all hostages. “If there are longer pauses that go beyond these two days, then you know we are in favor and we will continue to work on that,” said US National Security Council communications director John Kirby. The US government wants all hostages released. The G-7 foreign ministers of the US, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Britain and Canada have called for the same.
Washington expects more hostages with U.S. citizenship to be released, Kirby said. So far, a four-year-old American girl who witnessed the murder of her parents in the Hamas massacre is among those freed. The government believes two more women with US citizenship are being detained. Seven others with American passports are missing – it is unclear whether they are among the hostages.
Despite the ongoing ceasefire, Netanyahu reiterated the objective of military destruction of Hamas. He did not say how long the ceasefire might last. “We agreed that women and children and foreign hostages will be released first. After this happens, we will continue the fight,” Netanyahu told Welt TV in an interview published on Tuesday. Hamas committed the worst murders and will do it again, said the conservative head of government. “We have no choice but to destroy Hamas,” he said. Israel will continue to do everything possible to protect, as much as possible, civilians in the Gaza Strip. However, according to Hamas, almost 15,000 people were killed and around 36,000 were injured. Another 7,000 residents of the coastal strip are missing.