Israel and Hamas Agree to Ceasefire and Hostage Deal

Updated 1:30 p.m. Wednesday

Israel and Hamas have reached an agreement on a multiphase ceasefire that commits them to end the war in Gaza, President Biden and Qatar’s prime minister announced separately on Wednesday.

“This deal will halt the fighting in Gaza, surge much needed-humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians, and reunite the hostages with their families after more than 15 months in captivity,” Biden said. He said it was the same as a proposal he made in May 2024, which was endorsed by the United Nations Security Council.

Neither Israel nor Hamas immediately confirmed the deal, but officials close to the negotiations told NPR that both sides have reached a tentative ceasefire intended to end more than 15 months of the heaviest fighting ever between the two sides.

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there remained “several unresolved points,” but hoped “the details will be finalized tonight.”

The deal comes after weeks of intensive rounds of indirect negotiations in the Qatari capital Doha between Israel and Hamas, mediated by facilitators from the U.S., Egypt and Qatar. In an unusual twist, envoys from both President Biden’s administration and President-elect Donald Trump’s team were also there, pressuring the sides to close a deal.

The ceasefire is due to start on Sunday, according to Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani. Several technical details about the agreement remain unclear, and it will require formal ratification by Israel’s cabinet before it can take effect. Israel’s President Isaac Herzog called on “the cabinet and the government of Israel to accept and approve it when presented,” saying, “At great cost in blood, through enormous security, diplomatic, and societal efforts, we have created a moment of opportunity. We must seize it.”

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, said he was cutting short a trip to Europe to return to Israel for a government meeting on the ceasefire, expected to take place Thursday. The country’s culture and sports minister, Miki Zohar, said in a statement he would vote on the agreement Thursday with his cabinet colleagues. “It is the duty of every government minister to vote in favor of the deal,” Zohar said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Hamas had issued a statement that described a meeting between one of its senior leaders, Mohammed Darwish, and Ziad al-Nakhalah, the head of another armed faction that operates inside Gaza, the Islamic Jihad group. The statement said the two men’s discussion had involved “stressing the exertion of all efforts to make this round of negotiations a success.”

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres welcomed news of the agreement, saying, “Our priority must be to ease the tremendous suffering caused by this conflict. … I call on all parties to facilitate the rapid, unhindered, and safe humanitarian relief for all civilians in need.”

A deal in three phases

Many obstacles remain, though, with fighting still ongoing. Palestinian officials reported Israeli attacks killed more than 50 people on Wednesday. But if all goes as planned, the deal is expected to take effect within days and play out in three phases over an extended period.

In the first phase, lasting six weeks, Hamas promises to release 33 Israeli hostages in exchange for a far greater number of Palestinian detainees. It’s not clear how many are involved, since the group wants more detainees per each hostage freed alive, but has not said how many are still living. Most, but not all, are believed to be alive, according to Israeli officials.

The total number of Palestinians released from Israeli custody is expected to be around 1,000, according to a Palestinian official who was not authorized to speak to the media.

Israel will reduce — but not end — its military presence in Gaza during the first phase. Hamas will not release the final hostages and Israel will not fully withdraw from Gaza until a later phase. The timeframes involved were not immediately clear.

President-elect Trump commented on his social media platform that there was a deal involving hostages. “THEY WILL BE RELEASED SHORTLY,” he wrote on his Truth Social network.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Israeli President Isaac Herzog published a photograph on social media that showed Herzog meeting at his presidential residence in Jerusalem with the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Mirjana Spoljaric Egger, in what the spokesperson said was “part of preparations for the hostage deal.”

It’s the first truce since November 2023

This would be the first formal ceasefire since a one-week truce in November 2023, which included an exchange of about 100 Israeli hostages held in Gaza and 240 Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli prisons. Subsequently, other hostages in Gaza were rescued or found dead.

The war began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel from Gaza, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages into Gaza.

“We, the families of 98 hostages, welcome with overwhelming joy and relief the agreement to bring our loved ones home,” a statement by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said. “We wish to express our profound gratitude to President-elect Trump, President Biden, both administrations, and the international mediators for making this possible.”

The war has killed more than 46,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, who said the majority were women and children. The Israeli military says 405 soldiers have been killed in fighting since it invaded Gaza.

Israel and Hamas have fought a number of wars since the Palestinian militant organization wrested control of the Gaza Strip from the Palestinian Authority in 2007. However none of the previous conflicts have been nearly this long or this deadly.