November 22–Israel has agreed to a deal with Hamas to free 50 civilian hostages held by militants in Gaza in return for the release of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails and a series of pauses in the fighting.
The agreement, achieved after weeks of negotiations brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the U.S., marks the first major diplomatic breakthrough since the war began on October. 7
But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel will continue to fight the war against Hamas despite any pauses.
In a statement, the Israeli government said it would continue “the war in order to return all the hostages, to complete the elimination of Hamas and to ensure that there will be no renewed threat from Gaza to the State of Israel.”
For Israel, the exchange helps alleviate mounting domestic pressure on Netanyahu to cement a deal to free the 236 men, women and children being held by Hamas.
In exchange for the hostages, Hamas stands to realize one of its long-held goals of freeing Palestinian prisoners being held by Israel, whom many Palestinians view as wrongly imprisoned.
Israel launched the military campaign in Gaza in response to the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks—a surprise assault that left around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, dead in their homes and army bases, at an outdoor music festival and in the streets.
Once a pause in fighting takes effect, the pressure on Israel to pursue talks and potentially make its pause permanent could rise. It could also invite further pressure on Israel to negotiate the release of the rest of the Israeli hostages and potentially curb the government’s plans to pursue the total destruction of Hamas, according to analysts and former Israeli officials.
Relatives of the hostages have organized street protests and march to Jerusalem that drew thousands of demonstrators, and on Monday met with the war cabinet in Tel Aviv.
Israel has been split over how many concessions the country should make to retrieve the hostages.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Tuesday that Israel will be making “difficult, important decisions over the coming days.”
“I am aware of the pain that the families are experiencing and I would like to tell you that for me—returning the hostages is a primary goal and I will do everything possible to achieve it,” he said.
For Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, the pause in fighting might give time to regroup amid a punishing Israeli military campaign while achieving one of its political goals of freeing Palestinian prisoners.
“For Hamas, this will absolutely be presented at the very least as a symbolic victory. But there’s no doubt that Hamas has been significantly degraded by Israel’s assault,” said Tariq Kenney-Shawa, a U.S. Policy Fellow at Al-Shabaka, a Palestinian think tank based in the U.S.
For Hamas’s leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, the release of Palestinian prisoners would achieve one of the leader’s long-held goals. Sinwar, who learned Hebrew during his years in Israeli prison on murder conviction, is determined to free more Palestinians from Israel’s custody.
Sinwar himself was freed from prison in 2011 in historic prisoner exchange in which Israel freed more than 1,000 Palestinians in return for a single Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, who had been held by militants in Gaza. Sinwar remembered the exchange as a lesson that Israel will pay, sometimes in the extreme, to return captured Israelis.
Before Oct. 7, Israel held more than 5,000 Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza in its prisons, many convicted of security offenses. Since Oct. 7, the Israeli prison service has absorbed 2,601 new security prisoners, most adult male Palestinians.
Before the war, Israeli prisons held a few dozen female Palestinian prisoners and less than 200 minors, teenage boys between the ages of 14-18, with some under administrative detention, according to data from Hamoked, an Israeli human-rights group. Most of the women are convicted of committing attacks against Israelis while many of the minors are arrested for stone throwing.
The deal “brings into play the leverage that Hamas always had by virtue of holding these people, but it was a kind of latent leverage as long as Israel wasn’t going to go down the release negotiations path. That latent leverage now becomes quite potent leverage,” said Levy.
Both Israel and Hamas’ political leadership in exile have approved the deal, according to Egyptian officials who have played a central role. On Tuesday afternoon, the deal was still awaiting approval by Israel’s war cabinet.
Fighting continued Tuesday despite the impending deal. The Israeli military said it had completely encircled the Jabalia area north of Gaza City late on Monday and was preparing artillery and warplanes for further combat.
The Israeli military had used jet fighters and drones to strike more than 250 targets over a 24-hour period, including 3 tunnel shafts where Hamas fighters were hiding, and weapons depots, killing dozens of fighters.
