Hamas has told mediators of the truce deal that it is unable to identify and track down 40 Israeli hostages needed for the first phase of a ceasefire deal, US-based broadcaster CNN said citing an Israeli official and a source familiar with the discussions.
The negotiators have said that Hamas should release 40 of the remaining hostages, including all the women as well as sick and elderly men, during a first six-week pause in the fighting, under the framework that has been laid out by them.
Hamas has demanded hundreds of Palestinian prisoners to be released from Israeli prisons in exchange. Hamas told Qatari and Egyptian mediators that it does not have 40 living hostages who match the criteria for release. The report by CNN also suggested that there are less than 40 living hostages who meet the criteria.
Another official speaking to the US broadcaster said Hamas’s “inability or unwillingness” to tell Israel which hostages would be released and alive is a major hurdle.
The Israeli official said that as Hamas appears to be unable to reach 40 in the proposed categories, the Israelis will ask the group to release younger male hostages, including soldiers.
Over the past few months, Israel has repeatedly asked Hamas for a list of the hostages and their conditions. Hamas has not given the list saying that they need a ceasefire first in order to track and gather down the hostages.
The CNN report pointed out that the Palestinian armed group made the same argument before the November ceasefire where dozens of hostages were released during a week-long ceasefire.
The majority of the remaining 100 hostages who are alive are believed to be male IDF soldiers or men of military reserve age.
Meanwhile, an Israeli official speaking to Haaretz expressed concerns that the death of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh’s sons in an Israeli strike could derail hostage release talks.
Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh said three of his sons and few of his grandchildren were killed in an Israeli strike on the Gaza Strip.
The war broke out with Hamas’s October 7 attack against Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Palestinian militants also took more than 250 hostages, 129 of whom remain in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli army says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 33,360 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
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