DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Hamas has begun releasing 12 hostages from captivity in the Gaza Strip, according to the Israeli military.
The army said the first two hostages were transferred to Egypt late Wednesday. Ten more were expected to be released soon.
It was the sixth release of Israeli hostages as part of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Israel was due to release about 30 Palestinian prisoners later on Wednesday.
The ceasefire is due to expire early Thursday. International mediators worked to extend the ceasefire by several days to allow further hostage releases.
Hamas took around 240 hostages in the October 7 cross-border attack that sparked the war. Following the recent releases, around 150 hostages are said to still be in captivity.
This is a recent update. AP’s earlier story follows below.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — International mediators worked Wednesday to extend the ceasefire in Gaza, encouraging Hamas militants to continue releasing hostages in return for the release of Palestinian prisoners and further relief in Israel’s air and ground offensive . Otherwise the ceasefire will end within a day.
Before Wednesday’s planned exchange of 10 hostages held by militants for 30 Palestinian prisoners, Hamas handed over two Russian-Israeli prisoners, according to the Israeli military.
Israel has welcomed the release of dozens of hostages in recent days and said it will maintain the ceasefire if Hamas continues to release prisoners. Still, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stressed Wednesday that Israel would resume its campaign to eliminate Hamas, which has ruled Gaza for 16 years and orchestrated the deadly attack on Israel that sparked the war
“Will Israel resume the fight after this phase of repatriating our abductees has been exhausted? So my answer is a resounding yes,” he said. “We will definitely not fight until the end again.”
He spoke ahead of a visit by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to the region planned for this week to press for further extensions of the ceasefire and the release of hostages.
Weeks of heavy bombardment and a ground invasion destroyed large parts of the Gaza Strip and killed thousands of Palestinians. But it appears to have had little impact on Hamas’s rule, as evidenced by its ability to conduct complex negotiations, enforce ceasefires among other armed groups and organize the release of hostages. Hamas leaders, including Yehya Sinwar, are likely to have relocated to the south.
Most of Gaza’s 2.3 million people are now crowded into southern Gaza, with about three-quarters of them displaced from their homes. The ceasefire has led to a frantic rush for aid to feed their families, as aid arrives in larger but still insufficient quantities. The fear hovering over everyone is that fighting could break out again soon.
Palestinian Fairuze Salameh is greeted in the West Bank city of Ramallah after her release from prison by Israel early Wednesday, November 29, 2023, fifth day Tuesday. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)
Israeli soldiers work on a tank near the Gaza Strip border in southern Israel, Tuesday, November 28, 2023, on the fifth day of a temporary ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
A Palestinian collects his belongings southeast of Gaza City on Tuesday, November 28, 2023. On the fifth day of the temporary ceasefire between Hamas and Israel. (AP Photo/Adel Hana)
International pressure for a permanent ceasefire is increasing. An Israeli ground invasion in the south is likely to impose increasing costs in Palestinian lives and destruction that the United States, Israel’s most important ally, may not want to bear.
The Biden administration has told Israel that it would need to be far more precise in an offensive in the south.
“How far both sides will be willing to go in exchanging hostages and prisoners for the break will soon be tested, but the pressure and incentives for both to stick with it are stronger than the incentives at the moment “To go to war,” Martin Indyk, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel, wrote on X.
Diplomacy is increasing
The ceasefire is expected to end at some point on Wednesday following an exchange of hostages and prisoners.
Diaa Rashwan, head of Egypt’s state information services, said negotiations had made progress and it was “highly likely” an extension would be announced on Wednesday. Egypt, Qatar and the United States led mediation in the initial ceasefire and a two-day extension announced Monday.
The war began with Hamas’ attack on southern Israel on October 7, which killed over 1,200 people, mostly civilians. The militants kidnapped around 240 people back to Gaza, including babies, children, women, soldiers, older adults and Thai farm workers.
Israel responded with a devastating air strike in the Gaza Strip and a ground invasion in the north. More than 13,300 Palestinians have been killed, about two-thirds of them women and minors, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, which makes no distinction between civilians and combatants.
The toll is likely much higher because officials have updated the count only sporadically since Nov. 11 due to service outages in the north. According to the ministry, thousands more people are missing and are feared dead under the rubble.
Israel says 77 of its soldiers were killed in the ground offensive. It claims to have killed thousands of militants without providing evidence.
ISRAEL’S HOSTAGE DILEMMA
The suffering of the prisoners and the shock of the October 7 attack have increased Israeli support for the war. But Netanyahu is also under pressure to bring the hostages home and it could be difficult to restart the offensive if there is a prospect of more releases.
Israel said on Wednesday that about 160 hostages were still being held in Gaza. Of these, 126 are men and 35 are women. Four are under 18 and ten are over 75 years old. So far, both sides have released women and children for the exchange.
An Israeli official involved in hostage negotiations said efforts were focused on a two-day extension of the ceasefire to release all remaining women and children held by Hamas.
Until that happens, a further extension of the release of civilian men and soldiers will not be considered, he said. He estimated that there are “several dozen” soldiers in Hamas captivity, most of them male. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because negotiations were still ongoing.
When it comes to men – and soldiers in particular – Hamas is expected to push for similar releases of Palestinian men or prominent prisoners, a deal that Israel may resist.
A total of 60 Israelis were released under the ceasefire, most of whom appear to be physically healthy but shaken. Another 21 hostages – 19 Thais, one Filipino and one Russian-Israeli – were released in separate negotiations. Before the ceasefire, Hamas released four hostages and the Israeli army rescued one. Two others were found dead in Gaza.
This handout photo provided by GPO shows Gabriela and Mia Leimberg (rear) talking with their family from a meeting point in Israeli territory after they were released by Hamas on Tuesday, November 28, 2023. (GPO/Handout via AP)
Ahmed Salaima, 14, center, a Palestinian prisoner released by Israel, is hugged by his father as he returns home in East Jerusalem’s Ras al-Amud neighborhood, Tuesday, Nov. 28, 2023. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
So far, most of the 180 Palestinians released from Israeli prisons have been teenagers accused of throwing stones and firebombs during confrontations with Israeli forces. Several were women convicted by Israeli military courts of attempting to attack soldiers.
Palestinians have celebrated the release of people they say resisted Israel’s decades-long military occupation of areas they want for a future state.
Tense calm in GAZA
For Palestinians in Gaza, any calm that the ceasefire brought was overwhelmed by the search for help and horror at seeing the scale of destruction after weeks of hiding from the bombardment.
In the north, residents reported that entire blocks of apartments had been leveled in central Gaza City and in the neighboring refugee camps of Shati and Jabaliya.
The smell of rotting corpses trapped beneath collapsed buildings fills the air, said Mohmmed Mattar, a 29-year-old Gaza City resident who, along with other volunteers, is searching for bodies under rubble or on the streets.
So far during the ceasefire they have found and buried 46 people, he said. Most were unknown. More bodies lie in the rubble but cannot be reached without heavy equipment, Mattar said, adding they had seen other bodies scattered on the streets but could not reach them because Israeli positions were too close.
Little aid is reaching the north, where tens of thousands of civilians are believed to live. “Those who survived the bombing by the occupation will die of hunger,” said a woman in Shati camp, Umm Rami.
In the south, the ceasefire allowed more aid to be delivered from Egypt, up to 200 trucks per day. But aid officials say this is far from enough as most people now rely on outside aid. UN-run shelters housing more than a million displaced people are overcrowded, with many sleeping outside in cold, rainy weather.
At a distribution center in Rafah, large crowds of people line up every day to receive newly arrived bags of flour. But supplies are quickly running out before many can get their share.
“We were looking for bread for our children,” said a woman in line, Nawal Abu Namous. “Every day we come here…we spend money on transportation to get here, only to go home with nothing.”
Some markets and shops have reopened, but prices for the few items in stock have skyrocketed. A 25-kilogram bag of flour that once cost the equivalent of $2.7 now sells for $68.
Winter clothing is not available. A clothing store owner in Deir al-Balah told the Associated Press that he hates opening his doors in the morning because he knows he will spend most of the day apologizing to customers for don’t have any winter items.
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said about 111,000 people had respiratory infections and 75,000 had diarrhea, more than half of whom were younger than five. “More people could die from disease than from bombings.”
“We are fed up,” said Omar al-Darawi, who works at the overwhelmed Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza. “We want this war to stop.”
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Jeffery reported from Cairo and Lidman from Jerusalem.
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Complete AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war.