Gaza ceasefire: Israeli Cabinet approves deal

The Israeli government is preparing for the return of the hostages from Gaza, expecting many of them to have serious medical complications after more than a year in captivity in Gaza.

Israel's Health Ministry and the Hostages Family Forum, which represents families of the hostages, are making arrangements for the hostages based on the information shared by those previously held captive in Gaza.

Hagai Levine, who heads the health team at the Hostages Families Forum, said he expects the hostages would return with cardiovascular and respiratory issues due to the lack of ventilation in the tunnels.

Levine also expects the hostages to have vitamin deficiencies, starvation, dramatic weight loss, vision problems due to a lack of sunlight, broken bones, cognitive impairment and mental health trauma.

Hamas militants abducted about 250 people during attacks on October 7, 2023, that left 1,200 people dead. About 100 hostages are still being held, though Israel believes a third of them are no longer alive.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered a special task force to prepare to receive the 33 hostages who will be returning from Gaza during the first phase of the six-week ceasefire deal.

He said their families had been informed a deal had been reached.

Palestinian prisoners will also be freed in the first exchange. Israel's Justice Ministry published a list of 95 Palestinian detainees to be released.

Israel's Prison Services said it will handle the transport of prisoners instead of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

The full Israeli government, in the early hours of Saturday, voted in favor of the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release agreement after hours of consultations. 

"The government has approved the hostage return plan," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement, adding that the deal to halt the fighting with Hamas would come into effect on Sunday.

Twenty-four ministers voted for the agreement and eight voted against it.

The deal's measures call for :

• A full and complete six-week ceasefire to come into effect on Sunday.
• The first three of the 33 hostages to be released under the agreement will be handed over to Israeli authorities on Sunday as well.
• Israel to release 30 Palestinian prisoners held for each Israeli civilian hostage.
• The Israeli military to pull troops from populated areas of Gaza and to allow 600 aid trucks into the Palestinian territory daily.

As the Israeli government meets to vote on the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release agreement, Education Minister Yoav Kisch posted on X that he would give his approval to the agreement despite the cost being "extremely high."

"A complex decision — the price of the deal is very high, but we have a supreme moral obligation to bring our brothers and sisters home," he wrote.

"It's important for me to make it clear — we are not moving away from the goals of the war, no matter how long it takes — the return of all our hostages home, the collapse of the Hamas regime and the assurance that Gaza will not pose a threat to the State of Israel," he wrote.

Earlier on Friday, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said he voted for the deal during the Security Cabinet meeting and would do so at the full Cabinet meeting as well. 

International law expert Nomi Bar-Yaacov told DW that the stakes were very high and the ceasefire and hostage deal ought to hold.

She said she was more optimistic about the first stage of the deal, during which Hamas will release 33 Israeli hostages, including all women (soldiers and civilians), children, and men over 50.

She said the first stage will "definitely hold." "It may not hold easily, but I think that the pressure will be immense to get the 33 hostages back, the pressure in Israel and the pressure from [US] President-elect Donald Trump."

On the subsequent stages, Bar-Yaacov said she was less optimistic, but held out some hope. 

"I'd like to be cautiously optimistic about phases two and three. I think it will take huge amount of pressure, more so than we have seen in order to get the deal signed by President Trump. So hopeful, but very, very cautious. I think there will plenty of opportunity for breaches and I think there will be breaches on many fronts in the first stage too." 

DW correspondent Konstantin Eggert, who was reporting from Jerusalem, said that support for the deal that is currently being discussed by Israel's Cabinet is "fairly strong."

The numbers to back it up, Eggert said, came from polls conducted by the Israel Democracy Institute — 58% of Israelis said they approve the deal as is, and 12% said they would like an option to opt out of the deal that could see Israel continue with its military campaign against Hamas.

But taken together, 70% of people favor the deal and Eggert said "it's not a surprise" since pictures of people taken hostage by Hamas, and whose release would be part of the deal, are all over the country.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog applauded the Security Cabinet's decision to approve the hostage and ceasefire deal, saying there was "no greater moral, human, Jewish, and Israeli duty. We must bring all of our hostages back home."

Herzog said he expected the 33-member wider Israeli Cabinet, that is currently meeting to discuss the agreement, to approve it too.

Herzog also pointed to the challenges, writing that "I harbor no illusions — the deal will bring with it great challenges and painful, agonizing moments that we will need to overcome and face together."

"With all my heart, I embrace the families of the hostages, especially those who know that their loved ones will not return in the first stage. We must bring everyone back. Everyone! We will not rest or relent until this happens," he wrote.

Israel's prison service said that measures were being taken to prevent "public displays of joy" when Palestinian prisoners were released as part of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, which has yet to be approved by the Israeli government.

The AFP news agency reported that preparations were underway for the release of Palestinian prisoners in return for Israeli hostages, citing a prison service statement.

The prison service said that two jails, one near Jerusalem and another near the southern city of Ashkelon, had started preparing the releases by gathering prisoners to be freed.

"The commissioner of the Israel Prison Service, Major General Kobi Yakobi, instructed that... to prevent public displays of joy in Ashkelon and other areas of Israel, the escort from 'Shikma' Prison will not be handled by civilian buses of the [International Committee of the] Red Cross," the statement said.

"Special units" from the prison service would instead deal with transport.

Jakobi said that prisoners identified for release were also told to "refrain from expressions of joy within Israel."

Israel's offensive in Gaza since the October 7, 2023, terror attacks has killed more than 46,876 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory's Health Ministry. 

There were at least 88 deaths in the past 24 hours, a ministry statement said, adding that 110,642 people have been wounded since the latest conflict began.

The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but the UN and multiple humanitarian organizations consider the casualty numbers broadly reliable.

Around half of Gaza's 2.3 million inhabitants are children and the UN says the majority of civilians killed have been women and children. 

Israel launched its Gaza operation after the 2023 Hamas attacks in southern Israel that killed some 1,200 people. 

The Israeli Security Cabinet has recommended the approval of the ceasefire and hostage return agreement with Hamas.

This comes ahead of a full cabinet meeting expected to take place at 3.30 p.m. local time (13:30 GMT) Friday.

Once the Cabinet has ratified the deal Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that it would then take effect on Sunday.

The German government has called on Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas to adhere fully to a ceasefire agreement  in the Gaza Strip.

"We call on all parties ... to take all steps to ensure that this agreement can now be implemented," a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said.

"It is important that the first steps are taken successfully and that all those who bear responsibility then remain on this path," she added.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock described the deal on Thursday as a "major breakthrough" but cautioned that many challenges still lay ahead.  

A UNICEF  (The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund) spokeswoman has told DW that although news of the ceasefire deal was hailed with joy in Gaza, there is still little feeling in the Palestinian enclave that a truce will soon be in place.

"Here in southern Gaza and Al-Mawasi, it doesn't really feel or sound like a ceasefire yet," said Rosalia Bollen. "This morning I woke up to the very strong buzz of drones flying over, so that continues unabated." 

Bollen said that two nights ago news of the deal "was received with tremendous joy, just an outpouring of joy and jubilation."

"People are longing for an end to this war. To go back to their homes to see what's left of it. Children I speak to tell me that they long to sleep in their beds. They want their bedrooms, they want to see what's left of it. So everyone is very desperate and hopeful," Bollen said.

However, she pointed out that attacks were continuing to claim lives and that at least 20 children had been among those recently killed.

Bollen also highlighted the dire humanitarian situation in the enclave.

"Children, they're cold. They walk around in summer clothes, they don't have proper clothes. Their shelters aren't protecting them from the cold and the rain. They live in makeshift tents. They haven't had a proper meal for well over a year. Families live off canned food and flour. Health care has been decimated. Children have been out of school for one year and a half. So the needs are immense."

Several of the hostages taken by Palestinian militant groups led by Hamas during the deadly raid in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, are expected to be freed on Sunday if a deal reached between Israel and Hamas is approved by the Israeli government, the Israeli prime minister's office has said.

"Pending approval by the Security Cabinet and the government, and the agreement taking effect, the release of the hostages will be implemented according to the planned framework in which the hostages are expected to be released on Sunday," it said in a statement.

The first phase of the deal should see the release of 33 hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza.  

The French AFP news agency cited two sources close to Hamas as saying that three Israeli women soldiers will form the first group of hostages released.

French President Emmanuel Macron was also cited as saying that French-Israeli citizens Ofer Kalderon and Ohad Yahalomi are in the first group of 33 hostages to be freed.

One of the sources said the hostages would be first taken to Egypt before being transported to Israel.

Australian police said they were investigating after a series of what they called antisemitic "hate crimes" in a wealthy suburb in the east of Sydney.

Two cars were torched and other vehicles were painted with anti-Jewish slurs near the former home of a Jewish community leader on Friday in Dover Heights.

A house once belonging to prominent Jewish Australian advocate Alex Ryvchin was also splashed with red paint. Police are investigating whether the attack was aimed at him.

"We will hunt you down, we will find you and lock you up," New South Wales state police minister Yasmin Catley said.

"What we are seeing on our streets is totally un-Australian," she said. 

Last week, two synagogues in Sydney were defaced with Nazi symbols, while arsonists set a synagogue in Melbourne on fire in December.

The Australian government has since set up a federal task force to tackle antisemitism.