Gaza ceasefire: Israel security cabinet to meet on Friday after hostage deal reached, Netanyahu says – live | Israel

Analysis: ceasefire seals significant defeat for Hamas

Jason Burke

The ceasefire due to come into force, barring a major last-minute problem, will cement massive and rapid changes across the Middle East and may seal a significant defeat for the Islamist militant groups that have been powerful actors in the region for years.

Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and assorted Shia Muslim militia in Iraq and Syria will all emerge from the conflict considerably weakened. Only the Houthis in Yemen are stronger – though this may not last. The Islamic State remains a shadow of its former self.

For an organisation like Hamas simply to survive a big conflict is an achievement, and means Israel has failed to achieve one of its primary war aims. But the concessions made by Hamas since coming close to a ceasefire last May underline its enfeebled state.

Though no reliable statistics exist and Hamas has undoubtedly recruited many new fighters, its military arm has been badly degraded by the Israeli onslaught, with most senior and middle-ranking commanders killed.

The organisation maintains patchy authority in some areas of Gaza but nothing that resembles its full control through the 16 years when it completely controlled local government.

US president-elect Donald Trump has said the Gaza ceasefire deal had “better be done before I take the oath of office” on Monday and called outgoing president Joe Biden “ungracious” for claiming credit for it. AFP reports:

Four days away from being inaugurated for a second term, Trump told the Dan Bongino Show that negotiations would have never finalised without pressure from his team, including Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.

“If we weren’t involved in this deal, the deal would’ve never happened,” Trump said.

“We changed the course of it, and we changed it fast, and frankly, it better be done before I take the oath of office,” he added.

Trump also blasted outgoing President Joe Biden for taking credit for the ceasefire agreement, calling him “ungracious” and saying: “He didn’t do anything! If I didn’t do this, if we didn’t get involved, the hostages would never be out.”

Aside from a week-long ceasefire in November 2023, Biden has failed throughout the 15 months of the war to get Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to a further truce and has instead supplied him with billions of dollars worth of weapons.

To read more about who should be claiming credit for the agreement, read my colleague Andrew Roth’s piece:

Families of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails are eagerly awaiting their release following a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel that will liberate hundreds of detainees.

One thousand Palestinians arrested by Israeli troops in Gaza after the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023 who did not take part in the offensive will be released, and some of the freed Palestinians from the West Bank will be sent to third countries rather than be allowed to return home.

Mervat Moadi, 53, from the village of Jifna, north of Ramallah, was waiting anxiously for the official list of Palestinian prisoners to be released. Her husband, Marwan, 64, was jailed in 2012 for allegedly participating in an infamous incident in the second intifada in which two army reservists who got lost were lynched by a crowd at police station in Ramallah in 2000. He denies any wrongdoing, saying he was present in a crowd of funeral mourners.

Marwan, was charged and sentenced to eight years in prison, and his conviction was extended on appeal to 22 years. The couple have three sons, and grandchildren the man has never met.

“The last time I visited him was in July 2023, and after that we were unable to see him during the war,” Mervat said. ‘‘I am very nervous. My heart tells me that I will see him. Every hour that passes feels like a year. Waiting is very difficult for the family. We, as wives of prisoners, whether Palestinian or Israeli, suffer every moment. We do not know when we will see our loved ones.’’

Read on below:

Scores of Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, hours after the initial news of the ceasefire became public. Associated Press reports:

“We were expecting that the (Israeli) occupation would intensify the bombing, like they did every time there were reports of progress in truce talks,” said Mohammed Mahdi, who was sheltering in Gaza City.

Gaza’s health ministry said the toll of 72 from Thursday’s strikes only included bodies brought to two hospitals in Gaza City and that the number killed was likely higher.

“Yesterday was a bloody day, and today is bloodier,” said Zaher al-Wahedi, a health ministry official.

The Israeli military claimed it had struck approximately 50 militant targets across the Gaza Strip over the past day, including weapons storage facilities and rocket launch sites. It provided no evidence for the claim.

Photographs from hospitals in Gaza showed small children among the dead and injured.

The Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that five Palestinians including two women and two children were killed when an Israeli airstrike struck a house to the west of Jabalia.

The office of Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that a “deal for the release of the hostages” has been reached in Doha and that he has ordered the security cabinet to convene later on Friday, a day after originally intended.

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been updated by the negotiating team that agreements have been reached on a deal for the release of the hostages,” his office said in a post on X in the early hours of Friday. It continued:

The Prime Minister has directed that the Security Cabinet be convened later today [Friday)]. The Government will be convened later in order to approve the deal.

His office had accused Hamas on Thursday of reneging on key parts of the agreement to extort last-minute concessions. No evidence was provided for the allegation and Hamas denied it. Netanyahu has been accused of deliberately sabotaging previous deals for his own political benefit.

It was not immediately clear whether the full cabinet would meet on Friday or Saturday or whether there would be any delay to the start of the ceasefire on Sunday. The deal did not mention a ceasefire although the hostages will not be released by Hamas without one.

The Times of Israel reported that the full cabinet meeting would not take place until Saturday night, citing a Netanyahu spokesperson. According to the paper that’s because

Opponents of the deal must be given 24 hours to petition the High Court of Justice and a Friday afternoon meeting would not provide them enough time to do so because many of them are religious and observe the Sabbath.

That could mean that the ceasefire does not come into effect until Monday, a day later than originally planned, the paper wrote further:

Holding the full cabinet meeting on Saturday means the 24-hour grace period for petition filing won’t conclude until late Sunday, meaning the deal won’t come into place until Monday — a day after originally slated.

It was not immediately possible to confirm the report. We’ll bring you more details as soon as we have them.

Welcome to our live coverage of the Middle East crisis. Here’s a snapshot of the latest news.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said early on Friday that a deal to return hostages held in the Gaza Strip had been reached. The announcement comes a day after Netanyahu’s office said there were last-minute snags in talks to free hostages in return for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners.

Netanyahu said he would convene his security cabinet later on Friday and then the government to approve the ceasefire agreement.

On Thursday, Netanyahu’s office said the cabinet wouldn’t meet to approve the agreement for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of dozens of hostages until Hamas backed down, accusing the group of reneging on parts of the agreement in an attempt to gain further concessions.

Expanding on that and other news:

• Senior US officials insisted the hard-won ceasefire would go into effect on Sunday as planned despite an earlier delay. The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said he was “very confident” the ceasefire would go forward and he “fully expects that implementation will begin, as we said, on Sunday”. He confirmed that there had been a “loose end” between the sides in the complex negotiations. US representatives were still believed to be actively involved with talks in Doha on the final details needed to get the deal over the line.

• A vote is now expected to take place on Friday morning, Israeli media reported. Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, announced on Thursday evening that he would quit the government if it ratifies the ceasefire deal, calling it “irresponsible” and “reckless”. Ben-Gvir’s departure would not bring down Netanyahu’s government. Opposition leader Yair Lapid pledged his support for Netanyahu, saying that the deal was “more important than any disagreement we’ve ever had.”

• Fighting has continued in Gaza despite expectations of a ceasefire, with at least 80 Palestinians killed and hundreds more injured by Israeli airstrikes since the ceasefire announcement, according to the civil defence agency. The Israeli military said it had conducted strikes on “approximately 50 terror targets” across Gaza since late Wednesday. A civil defence spokesperson said its teams had recovered the bodies of five children after a strike on the northern city of Jabalia.

• More than 46,788 Palestinians have been killed and a further 110,453 wounded by Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, according to the latest figures by the territory’s health ministry on Thursday. They include 81 killed and 188 injured in the past 24 hours. Among them was Fatin Shaqoura-Salha, the chief of nursing staff at Al-Awda hospital in Nuseirat, ActionAid said.

• In the first phase of the ceasefire agreement announced on Wednesday – to last 42 days – Hamas agreed to release 33 hostages and in exchange, Israel would release 50 Palestinian prisoners for every female Israeli soldier released by Hamas, and 30 for other hostages. Palestinians displaced from their homes would be allowed to move freely around Gaza, wounded people would be evacuated for treatment abroad, and aid to the territory should increase to 600 trucks a day. A second phase would include Israel completely withdrawing from Gaza.

• The leader of Yemen’s Houthis, Abdul-Malik Badr al-Din al-Houthi, said the Iran-aligned group would suspend their attacks on Red Sea targets but continue if Israel backtracked on the ceasefire. The Houthi attacks have damaged as many as 30 ships and caused a diversion of commercial shipping to South Africa and the Cape of Good Hope. Reprisals by the US, Israel and the UK have damaged key Yemen ports and led to multiple deaths.

• Arab states are urging Israel and the incoming Trump administration to allow the Palestinian Authority (PA), in conjunction with the UN Palestinian relief agency Unrwa, to oversee Gaza’s recovery. The future governance of Gaza is due to be discussed at the start of negotiations on the second stage of the deal 16 days after a ceasefire begins.