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Israel Said to Clear Final Obstacles to Gaza Ceasefire Deal as Hostage Families Remain in Turmoil
Orthodox Jewish men stand near a tank, ahead of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, as seen from the Israeli side of the border with Gaza, Jan. 16, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
The last obstacles to a Gaza ceasefire and hostage-release deal had been ironed out, and Israel’s security cabinet was set to approve it on Friday, Israeli officials said on Thursday evening.
The news came after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delayed the agreement earlier in the day, accusing the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas of reneging on previously agreed-upon terms.
A US source, cited by Israeli journalist Barak Ravid, also confirmed that the differences had been resolved. Meanwhile, a senior US official vowed the deal would proceed by Sunday — a day ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
Although Qatari and American mediators announced on Wednesday that the deal had been finalized, Israeli officials refused to issue a confirmation, and on Thursday said last-minute obstacles had emerged.
The sticking points center on the list of Palestinian prisoners who have been detained in Israel largely for involvement in terrorist activities to be released in exchange for the hostages who remain in captivity in Gaza after being kidnapped during Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Hamas had attempted to overturn a key clause in the agreement that grants Israel veto power over the release of high-profile inmates who are considered “symbols of terrorism,” a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office said. Israel has also accused Hamas of “demanding to dictate the identity of these murderers,” in direct contradiction to the previously agreed-upon terms.
According to Israeli Channel 12 journalist Chaim Levinson, Hamas is insisting on the release of Hassan Salameh, the mastermind of the Bus 18 suicide bombings in Jerusalem in the 1990s, in which 46 Israelis were killed.
Additional disagreements reportedly involve logistical issues, such as control over the Philadelphia Corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border.
The strategic border strip has been a significant point of contention in the ceasefire and hostage-release discussions. Israel has insisted on maintaining a military presence in the corridor to prevent arms smuggling into Gaza, citing several dozen tunnels unearthed there. Officials on Thursday denied that Israel had agreed to withdraw its forces from it as part of the deal.
But Aryeh Deri — a member of Israel’s parliament, known as the Knesset, where he serves as the head of the Shas party that is part of Netanyahu’s ruling coalition — said on Thursday that he had received a “final announcement that all obstacles have been overcome and the deal is underway.”
“I want to congratulate Prime Minister Netanyahu — as he is responsible for the agreement,” he told his party.
Despite the lingering challenges earlier in the day, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby expressed confidence that the deal would proceed on Sunday.
“We’re aware of these issues that the prime minister has raised today, this afternoon, their time, and we’re working through that. Our team on the ground is actually working with him and his team to iron all this out and flatten it and get it moving forward,” Kirby told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
For families of the hostages, the delay has exacerbated an already unbearable wait.
“These truly are probably the most stressful days we’ve experienced in over a year since the last deal,” said Udi Goren, whose cousin Tal Haimi’s body remains in Hamas custody. Haimi was killed on Oct. 7, 2023, along with more than 1,200 others when Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists invaded southern Israel. His body was taken to Gaza. His wife, Ella Haimi, gave birth to the couple’s fourth child in May.
“For us, we have seen so many disappointments over these past 15 months. You know, if this saying were ever true — ‘I’ll believe it when I see it.’”
Emotions have run high, especially among bereaved families whose loved ones were killed by terrorists, many of whom oppose the deal, fearing it will lead to further terrorism down the line. Protests by those opposing the deal took place on Wednesday and Thursday evening in Jerusalem.
Israel Hayom journalist Ariel Kahana sharply criticized the role of Trump in pressuring Israel to finalize the emerging hostage deal, arguing it was pushed through prematurely. According to Kahana, senior Israeli officials believe Trump’s insistence on securing the agreement before his inauguration forced Netanyahu into accepting unfavorable terms. Describing it as “a bad deal, struck at the wrong time and under poor conditions,” Kahane claimed that waiting just a few more days could have allowed Israel to negotiate significantly better conditions.
“The deal, which is expected to take effect any moment now, will rehabilitate Hamas,” he argued. “The organization, which has suffered severe blows, will gain at least 1,000 new operatives directly from Israeli prisons. This influx of ‘new blood,’ quite literally, will undoubtedly lead to more bloodshed both within and outside Israel.”
“Why is the author of The Art of the Deal pushing Israel into a deal with the devil?” the journalist added, using the title of Trump’s popular 1987 book.
Goren called the agreement a “really bad deal.”
Nevertheless, he said it was a moral imperative to release the hostages now because that was the most pressing issue. “This is the consequence of Oct 7. I don’t want to say this is too high a price. This is the reality. The hostages will never, never come back by military force,” he said.
“Do I like it? No. They are insane jihadist terrorists,” Goren added.
Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists abducted 251 hostages during their rampage across Israel, which responded to the invasion with a military campaign aimed at freeing the captives and dismantling Hamas’s military and governing capabilities in neighboring Gaza.
More than 100 hostages were released as part of a temporary truce in November 2023, and others have been freed — both dead and alive — by Israeli rescue operations. Some 98 hostages are still in captivity, and at least a third of them are believed to be dead.
Addressing the families of terror victims opposed to the agreement, Goren acknowledged their concerns. “We’ve seen terrorists go back to terror. But does Israel have the ability and also the responsibility to track them after their release? Absolutely.”
He also addressed the families of Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers killed in the war who claim that their loved ones’ deaths were in vain if it would lead to the release of terrorists. Arguing that their sacrifice strengthened Israel’s negotiating position, Goren said, “The achievements in Gaza have allowed us to negotiate from a position of strength, ensuring Hamas no longer poses an existential threat to Israel.”
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Rashida Tlaib Renews Calls for Arms Embargo Against Israel Even as Jewish State Advances Toward Gaza Ceasefire
US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) addresses attendees as she takes part in a protest calling for a ceasefire in Gaza outside the US Capitol, in Washington, DC, US, Oct. 18, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Leah Millis
US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) on Thursday renewed calls for the implementation of an arms embargo against Israel, lambasting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as “genocidal” even as the Jewish state moved to agree to a ceasefire deal with Hamas to halt fighting in Gaza.
“Genocidal maniac Netanyahu and his cabinet will never stop until we have an arms embargo,” Tlaib posted on X/Twitter.
Tlaib’s comments came after Netanyahu paused the finalization of a ceasefire and hostage-release deal between Israel and Hamas, accusing the Palestinian terrorist group of “reneging” on previously agreed-upon terms.
“Hamas is reneging on the understandings and creating a last-minute crisis that is preventing an agreement,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “The Israeli cabinet will not convene until the mediators notify Israel that Hamas has accepted all elements of the agreement.”
The sticking points center on the list of Palestinian prisoners who have been detained in Israel largely for involvement in terrorist activities to be released in exchange for the hostages who remain in captivity in Gaza after being kidnapped during Hamas’s invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Hamas had attempted to overturn a key clause in the agreement that grants Israel veto power over the release of high-profile inmates who are considered “symbols of terrorism,” a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office said. Israel has also accused Hamas of “demanding to dictate the identity of these murderers,” in direct contradiction to the previously agreed-upon terms.
Later on Thursday, however, Israeli officials said the last obstacles to a Gaza ceasefire and hostage-release deal had been ironed out and Israel’s security cabinet was set to approve it on Friday. The agreement is supposed to go into effect on Sunday.
Tlaib, the first Palestinian American woman elected to the US Congress, has positioned herself as a fierce and outspoken critic of Israel. Since entering office, Tlaib has repeatedly accused the Jewish state of implementing an “apartheid” regime in the West Bank and turning Gaza into an “open-air prison.”
In the year following the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, Tlaib has sharpened her condemnations of the Jewish state. In the immediate aftermath of the massacre, she hesitated to release an official statement acknowledging the mass slaughter, abductions, and rapes perpetrated by Hamas. Less than two weeks after the invasion, Tlaib introduced a “ceasefire” resolution between Israel and Hamas. In November 2023, the House of Representatives voted to censure Tlaib over her anti-Israel rhetoric.
The progressive firebrand has also condemned Israel’s defensive military operations in Gaza, accusing the Jewish state of committing a full-scale “genocide” against the civilians of the enclave. She has also peddled the unsubstantiated claim that Israel has purposefully inflicted mass starvation against Palestinian civilians. Over the past year, Tlaib has urged the outgoing Biden administration to impose an arms embargo on Israel. Simmering with anger over the Biden administration’s support for Israel, she refused to endorse Kamala Harris for the US presidency.
Tlaib also slammed outgoing US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday, accusing the State Department official of lying to Congress and helping facilitate “starvation” in Gaza.
“Blinken lied to Congress and allowed starvation to be used as a weapon of war. It’s well documented. He supported war crimes and blatantly lied to Congress about it,” Tlaib wrote on X/Twitter.
On Wednesday, negotiators reached a deal to implement a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, potentially ending 15 months of war sparked by the terrorist group’s invasion of the Jewish state on Oct. 7, 2023. During the onslaught, Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped 251 hostages to Gaza.
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Rome’s Chief Rabbi Criticizes Pope Francis Over Israel Remarks
Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni speaks with Pope Francis during an inter-religious prayer for peace at the Colosseum in Rome, Italy, Oct. 25, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Remo Casilli
Rome’s chief Jewish rabbi on Thursday sharply criticized Pope Francis over the pontiff’s recent ramping up of criticism against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, in an unusually forceful speech during an annual Catholic-Jewish dialogue event.
Francis has unfairly focused his attention on Israel compared to other ongoing world conflicts, including those in Sudan, Yemen, Syria, and Ethiopia, said Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni, spiritual leader of Rome’s Jewish community since 2001.
“Selective indignation … weakens the pope’s strength,” said Di Segni.
“A pope cannot divide the world into children and stepchildren and must denounce the sufferings of all,” he said. “This is exactly what the Pope does not do.”
Francis, leader of the 1.4-billion-member Roman Catholic Church, has recently been more outspoken about Israel’s military campaign against Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Last week, he called the humanitarian situation in Gaza “very serious and shameful.”
A complex ceasefire accord between Israel and Hamas emerged on Wednesday, and is scheduled to start on Sunday.
Relations between the Catholic Church and Judaism have improved in recent decades, after centuries of animosity. The event on Thursday, held at a Catholic university, was organized to mark the 36th annual World Day of Catholic-Jewish Dialogue.
One of the organizers, Rev. Marco Gnavi, a Catholic priest, expressed surprise at Di Segni’s comments.
He said he felt “discomfort” because of the rabbi’s words. “You can’t ask us not to suffer both with you and with others,” said the priest.
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Judge Tosses Challenge to Lawsuit Alleging Mistreatment of Jewish Professor at California College
California College of the Arts in San Francisco. Photo: Edward H. Blake via Wikimedia Commons
A judge has denied a motion from the California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco to dismiss a lawsuit filed by a professor who alleges that she was disciplined and humiliated for disagreeing with students about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
As The Algemeiner has previously reported, professor Karen Fiss engaged in a brief conversation with anti-Zionist students who, due to being told a historical fact they preferred not to hear, filed a complaint against her with CCA’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) office which alleged that she had engaged in “harassing and discriminatory” behavior. Her legal counsel, provided by the nonprofit Jewish civil rights organization the Deborah Project, maintain that Fiss merely challenged the students’ anti-Zionist notions and apprised them of a 1991 incident in which Kuwait expelled nearly 300,000 Palestinians from its borders.
The college ultimately found Fiss guilty of the charges lodged against her, ruling that she had imposed her “power” on the students, who are women of color, and betrayed her cultural insensitivity by citing Kuwait’s expulsion of Palestinians in their conversation. The college further alleged that Fiss had used her “positional power as a professor to get the outcome [she] sought, which was for the students to agree with her point of view.” The college reached those findings but had previously declined to apply the same logic to an earlier complaint Fiss had filed about the Critical Ethnic Studies program’s issuing a statement — “DECOLONIZATION IS NOT A DINNER PARTY,” it said — which justified Hamas’s violence and implied that Jews are not indigenous to their own homeland.
That is because, the Deborah Project argues, CCA’s rules are in place to protect left-wing anti-Zionism and punish Jews who oppose it.
“According to CAA, academic freedom is an impenetrable bar to complaints about celebrating the slaughter and raping to death of Jews, but is made of Swiss cheese when a fully-tenured professor — Dr. Karen Fiss — explains to students some truths about the Middle East,” Lori Lowenthal Marcus, legal director of the Deborah Project, said in a statement included in a press release on Wednesday.
With her reputation blighted by scandal and the college threatening to revoke her tenure, Fiss resolved to fight for both her right to exist as a proud Jew at work and her right to free speech. She sued CAA for discriminating against her for being Jewish, a violation of Titles VI and VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and breach of contract, offenses which caused her “substantial damages” and other trauma.
Deploying the weapons contained in its legal arsenal, the college attempted to muzzle Fiss even in court by filing a motion to dismiss her case entirely, and later, to strike from her own complaint the most damaging allegations regarding the university’s alleged conduct — including that the college enforces a double-standard free speech code which protects anti-Zionists “who publicly call for the murder of Jews in Israel.”
However, Judge Haywood William of the US District Court for the Northern District of California has now struck down the college’s challenge to the case, clearing the way for it to enter discovery, during which her attorneys will amass additional evidence in support of Fiss’s allegations.
In Wednesday’s press release, Fiss’s legal counsel praised the decision.
“The Deborah Project looks forward to the state of litigation that follows denials of motions to dismiss, which is called the discovery phase,” it said. “We will learn how a leading California arts college lost its way and instead of focusing on art, became most focused on ‘Critical Ethnic Studies’ — which is the largest department in this ‘art’ school. Critical Ethnic Studies, inter alia, demonizes Jews, which are cast oppressors, and the Jewish State, which is described as a colonizing, ethnic cleansing, genocidal, and illicit country.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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