Palestinians celebrate the ceasefire agreement, Photo: Reuters
cheaters yesterday reached a phased agreement to end the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, after 15 months of bloodshed that has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Palestinians and ignited the Middle East.
The agreement provides for an initial phase of a six-week truce and includes the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and the release of hostages taken by Hamas, in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Joe Biden confirmed last night that an agreement had been reached, and the Qatari prime minister, one of the key mediators, said the truce would take effect on January 19.
Palestinians celebrated in the streets across Israeli-besieged Gaza – where they face an acute humanitarian crisis with severe food, water and fuel shortages – as explosions from fresh Israeli airstrikes continued to reverberate.
“I’m happy, yes, I’m crying, but they’re tears of joy,” Gada, a displaced mother of five, told Reuters. “We are reborn. With every hour of delay, Israel carried out a new massacre. I hope it’s all over now.”
The families of the Israeli hostages and their friends celebrated in the streets of Tel Aviv.
“The Israeli government must remain true to its goal of returning all hostages and ensuring that there is no longer a threat to the State of Israel from Gaza… so that there are no other parents standing here, like me, in a year, two or three, and to give interviews about their abducted children,” said Cvika Mor, the father of a prisoner in Gaza.
In Israel, the return of the hostages could ease public discontent with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing government over the October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas, which led to the deadliest day in the country’s history.
Netanyahu’s cabinet announced that Hamas dropped the request at the last minute, but that there are still several outstanding issues in the agreement. “We hope that the details will be agreed tonight,” the statement said.
A complicated road lies ahead, with major political pitfalls, according to the British agency.
The agreement comes after months of grueling, off-and-on talks led by Egyptian and Qatari mediators, with US support, and comes just before Donald Trump’s inauguration on January 20. Trump said he would use the truce agreement as leverage to expand the Abraham Accords – agreements reached during his first term that normalized Israel’s relations with several Arab countries.
Trump, who has repeatedly threatened that there will be “a hell of a price to pay” if the hostages are not freed before his inauguration on January 20, said he was “delighted that the American and Israeli hostages will be brought home.”
“Donald Trump’s tactical pressure and warnings to Hamas and Israel have apparently been effective in reviving protracted negotiations, where the Biden administration has been unwilling to put enough pressure on the Israeli leadership,” said Sanam Vakil of Chatham House in London.
If successful, the planned phased ceasefire would halt the fighting that has reduced much of densely populated Gaza to rubble and displaced most of the tiny enclave’s 2.3 million residents. The death toll continues to rise daily.
The truce could calm tensions across the Middle East, where the war has fueled clashes in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Iraq and raised fears of an all-out war between the main regional rivals, Israel and Iran.
If all goes according to plan, the Palestinians, Arab states and Israel will still need to agree on a vision for post-war Gaza, a huge challenge that includes security guarantees for Israel and investing billions of dollars in reconstruction.
One of the outstanding issues is who will govern Gaza after the war.
Israel has ruled out any involvement of Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007 and officially calls for Israel’s destruction. But Israel is almost equally opposed to Gaza being governed by the Palestinian Authority, a body established under the Oslo interim peace accords three decades ago, which has limited authority in the West Bank.
Israeli troops entered Gaza after Hamas-led gunmen breached security barriers and stormed communities in Israel’s border areas on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 soldiers and civilians and taking over 250 foreign and Israeli hostages.
The Israeli offensive since then has killed more than 46,000 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, while hundreds of thousands of displaced people struggle with cold and hunger in tents and makeshift shelters.
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Source: www.vijesti.me
