Keystone-SDA
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has instructed a delegation of senior officials to join ongoing negotiations in Qatar for a ceasefire and the release of hostages held in the Palestinian territory, his office announced.
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January 11, 2025 – 8:01 p.m.
(Keystone-ATS) According to the latter, Benjamin Netanyahu held a meeting in Jerusalem in the presence of American President-elect Donald Trump’s special envoy for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, a representative of the outgoing American administration, the Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz and Israeli security officials.
“The Prime Minister instructed the head of Mossad (foreign intelligence), the head of Shin Bet (domestic intelligence), Reserve General Nitzan Alon and his foreign policy advisor Ophir Falk to travel to Doha to continue promoting a agreement for the release of our hostages,” his office said in a statement.
“Historic opportunity”
A decision welcomed by the Families Forum, the main association of relatives of hostages, while rallies take place like every Saturday evening in the country’s major cities to demand their release.
“We call on the delegation to seize this historic opportunity to obtain the release of all our loved ones,” responded the Forum in a press release. “Let her do everything possible to come back with an agreement allowing the return of all the hostages, down to the last one.”
Indirect negotiations between Israel and Palestinian Hamas resumed last weekend in Qatar with a view to a ceasefire in Gaza, but Israel was not represented by senior officials.
These discussions focus on the release of hostages kidnapped during the unprecedented attack by the Islamist group Hamas on Israeli territory on October 7, 2023, according to several Israeli sources.
Progress
As the inauguration of Donald Trump approaches on January 20, outgoing US President Joe Biden reported Thursday “real progress” in the negotiations. For his part, Donald Trump recently promised “hell” to the region if the hostages were not released before his return to power.
The war in Gaza was triggered by the attack on October 7, 2023, which resulted in the death of 1,208 people, the majority civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data. That day, 251 people were kidnapped. Among them, 94 remain hostages in Gaza, 34 of whom were declared dead by the army.
More than 46,000 people, mainly civilians, were killed in the Israeli military campaign of reprisals in Gaza, according to data from the Hamas Ministry of Health, deemed reliable by the UN.
