Mediators scramble for Israel-Hamas truce extension, as hostages-for-prisoners swaps get harder

Virtually all of those freed so far have been women and children, but with few such hostages remaining in Gaza reaching a deal on an extension could prove more challenging. Hamas, a militant group that has ruled Gaza for 16 years, is expected to set a higher price for the remaining hostages, especially Israeli soldiers. About 140 hostages remain in Gaza, with more than 100 having been freed as part of the truce.

Qatar and Egypt, which have played a key role as mediators, are seeking to prolong a truce by another two days. Israel has pledged to resume its blistering offensive, aimed at crushing Hamas, if the militants don’t offer what it views as a satisfactory list of captives to be freed in return for an extension.

Israel has vowed to resume the war once hostage releases end, but faces growing pressure from its main ally, the United States to do more to protect Palestinian civilians.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who met Thursday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top officials on his third visit to the region since the start of the war two months ago, said he hoped the cease-fire could be extended and more hostages could be released.

Blinken also said that if Israel resumes the war and moves against southern Gaza to pursue Hamas, it must do so in “compliance with international humanitarian law” and must have “a clear plan in place” to protect civilians. He said Israeli leaders understood that ”the massive levels of civilian life and displacement scale we saw in the north must not be repeated in the south.”

International pressure has mounted to pause the war, triggered by Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel, as long as possible. Thousands of Palestinians in Gaza have been killed and more than three-quarters of the population of 2.3 million have been uprooted, after weeks of Israeli bombardment and a ground campaign, leading to a humanitarian crisis.

Most of Gaza’s population is now crammed into the south with no exit, raising questions over how an Israeli offensive there can avoid heavy civilian casualties.

Increasingly tense hostage talks

Netanyahu is under intense pressure from families of the hostages to bring them home. But his far-right governing partners are also pushing him to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed, and could abandon his coalition if he is seen as making too many concessions.

Israel says it will maintain the truce until Hamas stops releasing captives, at which point it will resume military operations aimed at eliminating the group, even as the Biden administration has urged it to operate with far greater precision if it does so.

The initial truce, which began Friday and has now been extended twice, called for the release of women and children. Israeli officials said before Thursday’s hostage releases that Gaza militants still hold around 30 women and children, who would all be released within a few days at the current rate.

The two women released earlier on Thursday — who are 21 and 40 years old — have returned to Israel. Hamas said it handed them over to the Red Cross in Gaza City, suggesting they may have been held in northern Gaza, where Israeli troops have controlled much of the area for weeks and have been searching for hostages.

It’s not clear how many of the remaining women hostages might be soldiers. For soldiers and the civilian men still in captivity, Hamas is expected to demand the release of high-profile Palestinians convicted of deadly attacks, something Israel has strongly resisted in the past.

Israel says around 125 men are still held hostage, including several dozen soldiers.

The 30 Palestinians due to be released by Israel on Thursday include 22 teenagers and eight Israeli Palestinian women who were arrested since the war started, most of them for pro-Palestinian social media posts, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Club, which advocates for prisoners. Israeli authorities have carried out a crackdown on such posts, arresting more than 270 Palestinian citizens on allegations of inciting violence, according to rights groups.

The 210 Palestinians released so far under the cease-fire have mostly been teenagers accused of throwing stones and firebombs during confrontations with Israeli forces. Several of the freed women were convicted by military courts of attempting to attack soldiers, some of them after being found carrying scissors or knives near security positions.

Before Thursday’s releases, a total of 75 Israelis, including dual nationals, had been freed during the truce, most of whom appear physically well but shaken. Another 24 hostages — 23 Thais and one Filipino — have also been released, including several men.

Before the cease-fire, Hamas released four hostages, and the Israeli army rescued one. Two others were found dead in Gaza. On Thursday, the military confirmed the death of Ofir Tzarfati, who was believed to be among the hostages, without providing any further details. The 27-year-old attended a music festival where at least 360 people were killed and several others were kidnapped on Oct. 7.

Hamas and other Palestinian militants killed over 1,200 people — mostly civilians — in their wide-ranging attack across southern Israel that day and took around 240 people captive. Authorities have only ever provided approximate figures.

Israel’s bombardment and ground invasion in Gaza have killed more than 13,300 Palestinians, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

The toll is likely much higher, as officials have only sporadically updated the count since Nov. 11. The ministry says thousands more people are feared dead under the rubble.

Israel says 77 of its soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive. It claims to have killed thousands of militants, without providing evidence.

Anxious respite in Gaza

Palestinians in Gaza have been calling for a permanent end to the war, saying the temporary truces don’t resolve the humanitarian catastrophe across the territory. Over 1.8 million people, around 80% of the territory’s population, have fled their homes, with more than 1 million sheltering in U.N. schools.

In the central city of Deir al-Balah, life’s daily struggle now consists of hunting down basic commodities such as flour and cooking gas that remain scarce despite increased aid entering during the truce.

“People want the war to stop … to see what happened in our homes and to our families,” said Samir Yaghi, who fled from Gaza City. He said he’s been searching for flour but can’t find any.