Conditional prisoner exchange between Israel and Palestine
Glimmers of hope for reaching an agreement
Despite intense clashes in Gaza, a conditional prisoner exchange between Israel and Palestine suggests a possible hostage deal between Israel and Hamas. On Sunday, Hamas militants clashed with Israeli forces trying to attack the largest refugee camp in Gaza. Despite this, U.S. and Israeli officials stated that reaching an agreement for the release of some hostages trapped in the area is not out of reach.
Around 240 people were taken hostage during the deadly Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7, prompting Israel to attack Palestinian territory to destroy the Hamas militia after several inconclusive wars since 2007.
The Israeli army says tanks and Israeli forces stormed Gaza late last month, taking control of vast areas in the north, northwest, and east around Gaza City. However, Hamas and local witnesses report that militants have launched guerrilla warfare in parts of the north and densely populated urban areas, including parts of Gaza City and the Jabalia and Beach refugee camps.
Michael Herzog, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, said in an interview with ABC’s This Week that Israel hopes a significant number of hostages held by Hamas will be released in the coming days. Reuters reported on November 15 that Qatari mediators, citing an informed official about the negotiations, were seeking an agreement between Israel and Hamas to exchange 50 hostages for a three-day ceasefire to increase the delivery of emergency and humanitarian aid to Gaza’s civilians. At that time, the official said that the general outlines had been agreed upon, but Israel was still negotiating the details.
On Sunday, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Qatar’s Prime Minister, said at a press conference in Doha that the main obstacles to the agreement are now very minor, and the remaining issues can be resolved with practical and logistical solutions. A White House official also stated that the negotiations are progressing in a highly complex and sensitive manner. John Finer, the White House Deputy National Security Advisor, told NBC, ‘I believe we are much closer to an agreement now than before.’
Staggering and unacceptable casualty figures
The sensitive talks surrounding the release of hostages coincide with Israel preparing to expand its attacks against Hamas to the southern half of Gaza and increasing airstrikes on targets that Israel considers Hamas militant hideouts.
However, Israel’s main ally, the United States, warned Israel on Sunday not to start military operations in the south until the safety of fleeing Palestinian civilians is ensured. The affected population of Gaza has been relocating and moving since the beginning of the war, taking refuge in hospitals or migrating from north to south, and in most cases, in utter despair, trying to stay away from the line of fire.
The Gaza government, run by Hamas, said that since then, at least 13,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli bombings, including at least 5,500 children. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres reiterated his call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, stating that the number of civilian casualties in Gaza is staggering and unacceptable.
Witnesses reported intense fighting on Sunday night between Hamas militants and Israeli forces trying to advance towards Jabalia, the largest camp in Gaza with nearly 100,000 residents. According to Palestinian doctors, Jabalia is a poor and crowded area that is a Palestinian refugee camp established during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war and has been repeatedly bombed by Israel, resulting in a large number of civilian casualties. Israel says that in these attacks, many Hamas militants rooted and hidden in the area have been killed.
The Israeli army, through social media in Arabic, asked residents of several Jabalia neighborhoods on Sunday to move south in Gaza for their safety, announcing that they would halt military actions from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. for this purpose.
The region’s health ministry said that after the pause period ended, eleven Palestinians were killed in Jabalia following an Israeli airstrike on a residential house. Palestinians say that the south has also been bombed several times by Israel, indicating the futility of Israel’s security promises. According to Israeli statistics, about 1,200 Israelis, mostly civilians, were killed in the unexpected Hamas attack, Operation Al-Aqsa Storm, on October 7, which was the deadliest day in the country’s 75-year history.
Israeli airstrikes, Hamas ambush
In the center of this narrow coastal region, Palestinian doctors reported that 31 people, including two local journalists, were killed in Israeli airstrikes targeting numerous homes in the Al-Bureij and Nuseirat refugee camps. They also added that in another airstrike, a woman and her child were killed overnight in the main city of Khan Younis in the south of the country.
At Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, dozens of Palestinians marched to hold funerals for 15 residents killed in an Israeli attack on an apartment on Saturday. Haida Asfour, a relative of some of the deceased, lamented, ‘Our young people are dying, our women and children are dying, where are the Arab presidents?’ The Israeli army says that Hamas uses residential buildings and other civilian structures as cover for command centers, weapons depots, missile launch platforms, and an extensive network of underground tunnels, but Hamas consistently denies using human shields.
The armed wing of Hamas, the Al-Qassam Brigades, said that Israeli fighters killed six soldiers in the village of Juhr al-Dik east of Gaza City after ambushing them with an anti-personnel missile and approaching with machine guns at close range. According to the latest Israeli army statistics, a total of 64 Israeli soldiers have been killed in this conflict.
Death zone in Gaza’s largest hospital
A team led by the World Health Organization visited Al-Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest hospital, just days after Israeli forces advanced to capture the site to eradicate an underground Hamas command center, describing it as a death zone.
The World Health Organization team reported signs of shooting and shelling and a mass grave at the entrance of Al-Shifa and said they are planning to urgently evacuate 291 remaining patients, including war-wounded and 25 staff members.
Gaza’s health ministry announced that on Sunday, 31 premature babies were evacuated from Al-Shifa Hospital in a joint operation by the United Nations and the Palestinian Red Crescent and will be transferred to Egypt via the southern Rafah border crossing for hospitalization. According to the organization, eight premature babies had previously died at Al-Shifa due to a lack of electricity and medicine, which are critical for special care.
Hundreds of other patients, staff, and displaced people who had taken refuge at Al-Shifa left on Saturday. Palestinian health officials said Israeli soldiers forcibly removed them, a claim denied by the Israeli army, which asserted that the departures were voluntary.