POBNEWS24, Dhaka Jan 15, 2025 : Israelis and Gazans on Tuesday anxiously awaited a long-sought truce deal, with relatives of hostages calling for
their release, and displaced Palestinians praying for a chance to return
home.
Multiple officials from mediating countries involved in the negotiations have
said a deal on a ceasefire and hostage-prisoner exchange is closer than ever,
with Qatar saying negotiations were in their “final stages”.
In Israel, since the early morning, the families of hostages and their
supporters gathered outside the parliament and the office of Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu to demand that every effort be made to secure a deal after
months of disappointment.
“Time is of the essence, and time does not favour the hostages,” said Gil
Dickmann, cousin of former hostage Carmel Gat, whose body was recovered from
a Gaza tunnel in September.
“Hostages who are alive will end up dead. Hostages who are dead might be
lost,” Dickmann said at a rally in Jerusalem. “We have to act now.”
Earlier on Tuesday, Dickmann and several other relatives of hostages still
being held in Gaza met with Netanyahu to press him to agree to a deal.
“If we stop the war, we will receive all the hostages immediately,” said Eli
Shtivi, father of former hostage Ilan Shtivi.
“So, that is what needs to be done.”
The war in Gaza erupted after Hamas’s unprecedented attack on Israel on
October 7, 2023.
The attack, the deadliest in Israel’s history, resulted in the deaths of
1,210 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli
figures.
On that day, militants also took 251 people hostage, of whom 94 remain in
Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign in Gaza has since killed 46,645 people, the
majority civilians, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run
territory, whose figures are considered reliable by the UN.
The extensive military offensive has left much of Gaza in ruins, displacing
most of its residents during the course of more than 15 months of war.
– ‘Back from the dead’ –
The longing to end the war is deeply felt in Gaza as well.
“I’m anxiously awaiting the truce. I will cry for days on end,” said Umm
Ibrahim Abu Sultan, a resident of Gaza City now living in Khan Yunis after
being displaced along with her five children. “We lost everything.”
She expressed disbelief at the possibility of reuniting with her husband, who
remained in Gaza City.
“I’m waiting for the announcement of the agreement. I just want to go back to
my home, my area, and my family. It feels like we’re coming back from the
dead,” she said.
Displaced Gazan Hassan Al-Madhoun said he had been waiting for 15 months for
a deal.
“I can’t even imagine how I’ll feel when we return to Jabalia and to our
destroyed home,” he said.
“It will take time to process the extent of the loss. The martyrs are still
buried under the rubble.”
Back in Israel, however, not everyone was in favour of a ceasefire.
“They (Hamas) need to raise their hands and say, ‘That’s it. We’re giving you
the hostages back because you won,’ and that’s not what’s happening,” said
Barbara Haskel at a rally protesting the proposed deal.
