After 15 months of war, Israel and Hamas reached an agreement for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages. The return operation is called Derech Eretz, "the path of the land" in Hebrew.
The agreement will come into effect on Sunday, January 19, and is in three phases, with an initial 42-day ceasefire during which there will be a gradual release of the first 33 hostages and a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from populated areas of the Gaza Strip. The third phase envisages the return of the bodies of the killed hostages held in Gaza and the establishment of a reconstruction plan and a new governing structure.
Israel reportedly agreed to release at least 1,000 Palestinian prisoners during the first phase, including about 190 who have been serving 15-year sentences (including some sentenced to life imprisonment). No one will be allowed to go to the West Bank, and none of the militiamen who took part in the October 7, 2023 attack will be released, nor will Marwan Barghouti, the leader of the first Intifada sentenced to life imprisonment, be released. Israel also rejected Hamas’s demand to return the body of Yahya Sinwar, the militia leader killed last October.
Vehicles and other transport will be able to pass through a crossing adjacent to Salah al-Din Street, monitored by an X-ray machine operated by a Qatari-Egyptian security team. The agreement will reportedly see Israeli forces remain in the Philadelphia Corridor, which separates Gaza from the Egyptian Sinai in the south of the Strip, while maintaining a buffer zone of about 800 meters along the eastern and northern borders during the first 42-day phase. Israeli forces are also to withdraw from the Netzarim Corridor, which divides the Strip in two and leads to the Mediterranean.
The agreement will also include an increase in humanitarian aid sent to the Strip by international organizations, including the United Nations, to an estimated 600 truckloads per day.
Many Palestinians and families of Israeli hostages celebrated the news, but the fighting on the ground in Gaza did not stop.
The Hamas-run Civil Defense Agency reported that Israeli airstrikes killed more than 20 people after the Qatari announcement. They included 12 people living in an apartment block in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City, it said. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.
Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas - which is banned as a terrorist organization by Israel, the US and others - in response to an October 7, 2023 attack in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.
More than 46,700 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Most of the population of 2.3 million has been displaced, while there is widespread destruction and severe shortages of food, fuel, medicine and shelter.
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