Mediator Qatar on Saturday announced a deadline for a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas to come into force tomorrow, beginning the final preparations for a deal that most of the world hopes will end 15 months of destruction in Gaza.
The deal should come into effect at 8:30 a.m. local time on Sunday, said Majed al-Ansari, a spokesman for Qatar’s Foreign Ministry, which has spent months with the United States and Egypt struggling to reach an agreement.
The Israeli government approved the deal early Saturday after hours of negotiations and amid internal disputes in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling coalition. The approval cleared the final hurdle, raising hopes for Israelis who want to see their loved ones return and Gazans who survived the 21st century’s most intense bombing campaign.
“It’s a mixture of happiness, sadness and longing for a new beginning,” said Mariam Moeen Awwad, 23, who has been driven from her home in northern Gaza six times since the war began.
Mrs. Awad had planned to move into her newly furnished apartment with her husband in November 2023. The war disrupted those plans, leaving the couple stranded and longing to return home, she said, “if it’s still there.”
In Israel, the authorities have begun preparations to welcome a large number of hostages home, not knowing whether they will return malnourished, traumatized or dead.
In his first words since the ceasefire was approved, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered his speech on Saturday night and said that 33 hostages would be released in the first phase of the agreement, “most of whom are still alive.”
Defending the deal, he also noted that Israel has made significant strategic gains in the past few months, including the killing of senior Hamas leaders. “As I promised you – we changed the face of the Middle East,” he said.
Three reception centers for hostages have been established near the Gaza border, according to an Israeli military official. Those will be monitored by Israeli soldiers, as well as doctors and psychiatrists, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in accordance with the process.
The release of the hostages is expected to be the first such major exchange since the week-long suspension at the beginning of the war.
“Those who were released at that time were already well-nourished,” said Hagar Mizrahi, the head of Israel’s health ministry, about the hostages released during the 2023 peacetime. Think of their situation now, after 400 more days. We are very concerned about this.”
Of the women, elderly men and other captives to be returned, many are believed to have been held in Hamas trenches in Gaza, under conditions that may leave physical and psychological scars. Israeli hospitals are setting up isolation areas where hostages can begin their recovery in private.
“In the past, we saw the Red Cross transferring the hostages, and some of them were running to their relatives, hugging them,” said Einat Yehene, a psychologist who works with the Hostage Families Forum, a human rights group. “It’s not going to be easy and the same this time, given the physical and emotional conditions we’re expecting.”
In exchange, hundreds of Palestinian prisoners will be released. The number of prisoners to be released and their identities were among the many points of contention involved in the deal negotiations.
The new agreement also calls for allowing 600 aid trucks to enter Gaza every day as well as negotiations for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the area and a permanent end to the war.
Those talks are likely to be bitter and difficult, like the months of negotiations that produced this week’s ceasefire agreement. Mr. Netanyahu is already facing an internal revolt within the ruling coalition, with his far-right allies threatening to leave it over their opposition to the deal.
They called for the war to continue and eliminate Hamas, which led an attack on Israel in October 2023 that killed around 1,200 people, captured another 250 and started the war.
Mr. Netanyahu is also facing pressure from many Israelis who want the return of all hostages, and from the outgoing US president, Joseph R. Biden Jr., and the president-elect, Donald J. Trump, who both want an end to the war.
In his speech, Mr. Netanyahu said the agreement preserves Israel’s right to return to war with Hamas if it chooses. The agreement also allows Israeli forces to occupy a protected area along Israel’s border with Gaza and Gaza’s border with Egypt, he added, at least initially.
“If we need to go back to fighting, we will do it in new ways and with greater strength,” he said.
Another uncertainty is how a deal might happen because of the chaotic, devastated conditions in Gaza, where tens of thousands of people have been killed since the war began and hundreds of thousands more remain without homes, clean water or ready-made food or medicine. .
Israel’s campaign has left a gaping hole in much of Gaza, and lawlessness has proved a dangerous factor in efforts to get aid to the needy. Organized looting has also robbed trucks of goods, including a convoy of 100 trucks carrying UN aid late last year.
Israel has continued to attack Gaza since the ceasefire was announced, and in the past 24 hours, 23 Palestinians were killed and 83 wounded, the Gaza Health Ministry said Saturday morning. More than 46,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the war began, according to the ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians.
Much-needed aid is expected to flow into Gaza once the ceasefire begins. Egypt, which shares a border with the enclave, was stepping up preparations on Friday to deliver aid including food and tents, according to Al Qahera News, Egypt’s state broadcaster.
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