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Canadian relatives of Israeli hostages share emotional reactions at the start of the ceasefire deal with Hamas

Iris Weinstein Haggai watched the release of three Israeli women hostages from Gaza on Jan. 19 while in Washington, D.C.

In one word, she found the experience “bittersweet.”

Her parents were killed in the Oct.7, 2023 Hamas attacks on their home in Kibbutz Nir Oz. The bodies of Gadi Haggai and Judih Weinstein Haggai were taken to Gaza, where they have been kept as bargaining chips for over 15 months.

Gadi had American and Israeli citizenship, while Judih was born in the U.S. but grew up in Canada.

Judith Weinstein Haggai and her husband Gadi Haggai.

Under a negotiated ceasefire and hostage deal, the first three hostages—Emily Damari, Romi Gonen and Doron Steinbrecher—were returned to Israel. The IDF also recovered the body of soldier Oron Shaul, who was killed in Gaza in 2014.

The agreement states that 33 hostages—women, children and the elderly—are to be released over the next few weeks. Not all of them have been confirmed to be alive.

The timing of the release of the remaining 65 hostages, including the bodies of Iris’s parents, are to be negotiated in a second round, which has yet to begin.

“I have to be cautious. My heart is breaking every single day,” she said in a phone interview with The CJN on Jan. 19.  “Even today, I was expecting to see my friends on the list and I’m very happy for the ones who are coming out, for their families. Of course, I’m happy for everyone who is free from that hell, but it’s bittersweet because you want your own people to come out.

“There are still 29 people from my community, Kibbutz Nir Oz, who are still held hostage, so this is far from over.”

Iris’s parents were killed Oct. 7, during their regular early morning walk near the kibbutz. While the family knew that Gadi had been killed that morning, it was not until December, 2023, several months after the attacks, that they learned that Judih had also died that day.

Iris Weinstein in Toronto, October 29, 2024. (Credit: Jonathan Rothman)

“If I’m completely honest, of course I’m happy that whoever gets out of that nightmare, the underground torture dungeons in Gaza.  I’ve come to know the families, it’s been 471 days. But it also brings me back to the last (hostage release) deal in November 2023 when I waited every single night for my mom’s name to be on the list and every night I would get a ‘no’. Not only my parents are held hostage, but my friends are currently there.

“So while I’m so, so happy to see Romi and Emily and Doron come out, I’m also heartbroken that my friend Shiri Bibas and her two children are not coming out.”

Bibas and her two sons, Kfir, who celebrated his second birthday this week, and Ariel, now 5, were kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz, along with Shiri’s husband Yarden. Her parents were killed in the attack.

Weinstein Haggai, who now lives in Singapore with her young family, was in D.C. this weekend for the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump. She has travelled numerous times to Washington, as well as Ottawa, to press for the release of her parents and other hostages since Oct. 7, 2023.

She found American politicians have been willing to listen to the hostage families—and that it was “inspiring” that the outgoing Biden administration and the incoming Trump one worked together to get Hamas to the negotiating table.

Trump had said “all hell will break out” if the hostages were not released before his Jan. 20 inauguration.

“There’s a reason this deal is happening, and hopefully we’ll see its completion, because of what President Trump said. This is not me taking a political stance,” Iris said. “Once he finally said something about these terrorists releasing these hostages, things started happening. It’s very sad to me that this is the first world leader to hold these terrorists accountable.”

Iris has met with Justin Trudeau and Mélanie Joly, pleading with the top Ottawa offices to pressure the International Red Cross to visit the hostages, and confirm who was even alive. However, the Liberal politicians have been less transparent and helpful than their American counterparts—even in the case of her mother, who is the only remaining Canadian hostage.

“Even a few days ago when Trudeau put out a statement about how he accepts the ceasefire, he didn’t even mention my mom. It’s been very, very disappointing.”

The fate of the young Bibas family and Judith Weinstein was also on the mind of Maureen Leshem, the Canadian cousin of hostage Romi Gonen, kidnapped from the Nova music festival.

In a news conference in Toronto on Sunday, she reflected on the family’s gratitude for Romi’s return—after over a year of tireless advocacy—as well as the plight of the remaining hostages.

“We are grateful to at last be liberated from 15 months of agonizing torment and uncertainty—a gruelling path that has pushed us beyond our limits, both physically and emotionally. Hope became our greatest source of power, as well as our heaviest burden. It has been an exhausting and punishing experience that I would not wish on anyone,” Leshem said, reading a prepared statement.

“I am deeply grateful to every single person who embraced Romi and stood by us in our fight for her freedom—everyone who followed her plight closely, shared her story widely, sent heartfelt messages of hope, and prayed tirelessly for her safe return. I am thankful for every person who recognized and validated the undeniabletruth of what she has endured.”

Leshem also recalled some of the other hostages. “And we must remember that there are still 94 hostages trapped in Hamas captivity—among them, Canadian citizen Judih Weinstein, a 2-year-old toddler and a 5-year-old child—in urgent need of rescue. We must speak up and demand their freedom, too. What kind of world do we create if we fail to fight for the innocent?”

The Bibas children were also on the minds of roughly 80 people who came to the Run For their Lives rally in Thornhill, Ont., a weekly walk to keep the hostages’ plight in the public eye. Many in the group carried pictures of the boys, or orange balloons reminiscent of the children’s bright-red hair.

The weekly rally for hostages in Thornhill, Ont., on Jan. 19, 2024, the day three women were released from Gaza. (Credit: Lila Sarick)

“There are no prerequisites required for supporting this cause, no prerequisite required for being outraged that a baby who was stolen at 9 months old will soon turn two in captivity,” organizer Michelle Factor told the group gathered in the lobby of the Promenade Shopping Centre, preparing to walk a kilometre in the frigid temperatures.

One of the walkers, Avishag Campbell, said she was buoyed by the news the three women had been freed. “It’s exciting news, but I think the price is very high. I’m happy for the family, I’m not really sure of the damage it’s caused. It’s going to be a very, very long rehabilitation, if it can be rehabilitated.”

As part of the hostage release agreement, Israel is set to free up to 1,900 prisoners and detainees, some of who have been convicted of serious crimes against Israelis.

“But we’re a people of life,” Campbell said. “We have to sacrifice a lot for one life.”

The hostage release agreement has been controversial in Israel, as some fear it will let Hamas regain control of the Gaza Strip.  

“The deal is horrible,” Iris Weinstein Haggai agrees. “But you cannot have a good deal with terrorists,” she says about the agreement that she hopes will eventually see her parents’ bodies returned to Israel for burial.

“Israel is releasing prisoners who murdered not only Israelis, but also Palestinians. They are horrible terrorists but that’s the price Israel is willing to pay. It’s just crazy to me that we are demanding two babies and my friend Shiri Bibas and the other side is demanding murderers and rapists to come back to them.”

 Negotiations for the second and third phase of hostage releases, which would include Israeli men and the bodies of those who were killed, have yet to even begin. Iris says she’s hopeful, but is aware that Israel is negotiating with a terrorist group and the situation can change rapidly.

“We don’t even know if the whole first phase will even happen. Every second you’re waiting for something to go wrong,” she said. “It’s the beginning of the end. I’m very optimistic that the process has begun. It’s more than anything that happened for the last 471 days.”

Weinstein Haggai has returned to Kibbutz Nir Oz several times since the attacks, that saw 117 members killed or taken hostage. Nearly every home on the kibbutz was damaged.

A few weeks ago, she took her family to Israel, the first time they have visited since Oct. 7. Her eldest daughter, who is 8, was heartbroken when she fully grasped that she was not going to be able to visit her grandparents on their kibbutz again.

 “Being there really emphasized that she’s not going to see them again, yet she kept asking me, ‘Mommy, if we don’t have a grave how do you know they’re dead?’” said iris.

“I should not have to answer that question and I’m going to have to answer that question until they come back.”

The post Canadian relatives of Israeli hostages share emotional reactions at the start of the ceasefire deal with Hamas appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.

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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa

Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.

Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.

“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”

GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’

Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.

“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.

“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.

“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.

After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”

RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL

Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”

Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.

“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”

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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco

Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.

People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.

“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”

Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.

On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.

Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.

On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.

“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.

Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.

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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas

Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.

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