Israel-Hamas LIVE: First hostages are expected to be released by terror group tomorrow as Pope says the conflict ‘has gone beyond war – this is terrorism’

• UNICEF’S Executive Director Catherine Russell told the UN Security Council that only an immediate humanitarian ceasefire could ‘put a stop to this carnage’ in Gaza.
• She said: ‘For children to survive, for humanitarian workers to stay and effectively deliver, humanitarian pauses are simply not enough.’

• Columns of fire continue to rise over Gaza as Israel’s bombardment of the strip continues tonight, with pictures taken from southern Israel showing huge explosions.

• The US government envoy for the humanitarian situation in Gaza, David Satterfield, says Palestinians from the north who fled to the south of the Strip ‘must be allowed to return to homes in the north as soon as possible.’
• Satterfield reiterated the US position against the displacement of Palestinians in an interview with the Lebanese broadcaster al-Jadeed.

• The IDF says its Givati Infantry Brigade has captured the headquarters of Hamas’s northern Gaza brigade.
• The base was said to be in the Sheikh Za’id neighborhood, between Beit Hanoun and Jabalia refugee camp.
• Israel said the troops raided the compound, where they found a number of tunnel shafts and rocket production and launch site

Below is a video and stills from the footage the IDF released of the raid:

• Aid is set to pour into Gaza as soon as a four-day truce gets underway tomorrow.
• Sky reports that 300 trucks are queuing at the Rafah crossing waiting to deliver much-needed medicine and relief equipment.

• The Israeli military said it has intercepted a cruise missile that was launched towards the south of the country.
• After reports of ‘an infiltration by a hostile aircraft’ near the southern Red Sea resort of Eilat, an Israeli fighter jet ‘successfully intercepted a cruise missile that was launched toward Israel‘, the IDF said in a statement. ‘No infiltration into Israeli territory was identified,’ it added.
• News of the interception came as a cease-fire agreement between the Hamas terrorist group and Israel was confirmed by both parties.

• The Almagor Terror Victims Association has petitioned the Israeli High Court to delay the hostage deal with Hamas, Times of Israel reports.
• Under the terms of the agreement, Hamas will release 50 Israeli hostages in exchange for 150 Palestinian prisoners.
• The group has requested a delay in the deal’s implementation, claiming it violates the terms of a 2012 report on prisoner swaps which states that only a ‘small number of prisoners held by Israel can be released per Israeli captive being returned’.
• The petition is widely expected that the petition will be rejected by the High Court.

****WARNING: Pictures contain content readers may find distressing****

• Palestinians have been combing through the site of an Israeli air strike on a house in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip.
• The explosion covered surrounding palm trees in ash and blew a huge crater in the ground.

• The Syrian army claims Israel is hitting the capital Damascus with airstrikes.
• The statement said the rockets were fired from the Golan Heights and targeted outposts in the vicinity of the city.
• No casualties were reported and no further details were disclosed.

• UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the deal between Israel and Hamas is ‘important step in the right direction, but much more needs to be done.’
• Meanwhile, World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he welcomes the truce, but added: This is not enough to end the suffering of civilians.
• He called for the remaining hostages to be freed and for a ceasefire in Gaza.

• The Israel-Hamas deal agreed today for the freeing of 50 hostages held in Gaza in exchange for the release of 150 Palestinian prisoners will be repeated later this month, a Palestinian official has told Reuters.
• The news agency reports that the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that would mean a total release of 100 of the around 240 people Hamas seized during its October 7 killing spree in southern Israel.

Here is the Institute for the Study of War’s operational update from Tuesday, looking at the situation on the ground in Gaza.

• Even as talks drew closer on a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas, the US-based think tank says Israeli forces encircled Jabalia refugee camp and expanded their operations elsewhere.
• Palestinian fighters also continued their attacks on Israeli forces, it said.

You can read the ISW’s assessment below:

Hamas has announced the official terms of the truce agreement with Israel in a statement. They include:

• The release of 50 Israeli hostages – only including women and children below the age of 19.
• The release of 150 Palestinian women and children from Israeli prisons.
• A four-day ceasefire across the Gaza Strip, to be honoured by both parties.
• An increased entry of aid trucks carrying relief supplies, medical assistance, and fuel to all parts of the territory.
• No Israeli air traffic in the south of Gaza throughout the four days.
• No Israeli of air traffic in the north of Gaza from 10am to 4pm daily.
• Freedom of movement for civilians, particularly along the crucial Salah al Din road, the main highway which connects north and south Gaza.

Despite the truce, Hamas promised in the statement to ‘persist as the protective shield and defenders of our people.’

• Harrowing pictures show piles of corpses wrapped in blue body bags in a mass grave in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.
• The dead are reported to be Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes and fire who were transported from Al Shifa hospital in Gaza City for burial.

• Hamas is set to provide Israel with a list on Wednesday night of ten hostages set to be released tomorrow via the Red Cross, reports Israel National News.
• On Friday and Saturday, ten hostages will be released each day, while a further 20 will be released on Sunday – the last day of the ceasefire, according to reports.

• The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process has welcomed the truce deal, saying it is an ‘important step in the right direction’.
• Tor Wennesland said the pause ‘must be used to its fullest extent to facilitate the release of hostages and alleviate the dire needs of Palestinians in Gaza’.

Read his full statement below:

• Israeli politician Ben Gvir (pictured) said the release of the hostages sets a ‘dangerous precedent’ that could play into the hands of the terrorists.
• The far-right politician said the deal, which will see 150 Palestinians released in exchange for 50 hostages, gives Hamas terrorists everything they wanted.

• The IDF says its troops have exposed and destroyed around 400 Hamas tunnel shafts since the conflict began on 7 October.
• It claimed that many of the tunnel shafts its troops had uncovered are located in hospitals, schools and homes.

Watch the video released by the IDF here:

• The temporary truce between Hamas and Israel will come into force from 10am tomorrow, a Palestinian official told Al Jazeera.
• Hamas official Abu Marzouk said most of the hostages planned to be released have foreign citizenship, without specifying if they also hold Israeli passports, israel’s Channel 12 reports.
• Egypt’s state-run Qahera TV has also reported that the truce will begin at 10am local time tomorrow (8am UK time).

• The Pope told his general audience in St Peter’s Square today that he has heard directly from both sides in the Israel-Hamas conflict, and that each are suffering.
• ‘This is what wars do. But here we have gone beyond wars. This is not war. This is terrorism,’ he said.

• The Israel Defence Forces have renewed calls for residents in the north of the Gaza Strip to move south, despite an impending ceasefire.

• Israel expects to recover the first hostages being freed from the Gaza Strip tomorrow, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told Army Radio.
• Interviewed this morning, he declined to confirm a report that the process would begin at 5am on Thursday.

• Relatives of hostages seized from Israel by Palestinian militants said they were ‘very happy’ at the news that some of them are set to be released after a truce deal between Israel and Hamas.
• ‘We are very happy that a partial release is pending,’ the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement.
• As loved ones hold their breath as they wait to see who will be freed, the group added: ‘As of now, we don’t know exactly who will be released when.’

• Abigail Mor Edan, three, was among those kidnapped by Hamas on October 7.
• Her father Roy Edan, 43, a photojournalist, and his wife Smadar Edan, 40, were murdered but she escaped to a neighbor’s home.
• The American child is expected to be freed after a deal was brokered between Israel and Hamas.

Read the full story here:

• Palestinians sheltering in Al-Shifa hospital have been leaving in droves since it was occupied by Israeli forces last week.
• Over the weekend, 31 premature babies were taken out and moved to a hospital in the south.
• Now, more patients and wounded are expected to be moved elsewhere in Gaza.

• Israel has shared pictures that it says shows IDF troops operating inside Gaza ahead of a four-day ceasefire.
• The IDF said its forces were killing terrorists, destroying infrastructure and locating ‘weapons stored inside civilian buildings’.
• It added that troops had successfully ‘neutralised a terror tunnel shaft’ this morning.

• IDF spokesperson Daniel Hagari said that IDF warplanes hit several Hezbollah targets in Lebanon a short while ago.
• He shared aerial footage on X which he said showed ‘terrorist infrastructure’ being attacked.

• Shrone Lifschitz, whose mother was released by Hamas almost four weeks ago, has said she fears her captive father won’t ‘last much longer’.

Read the full story here:

The deal between Israel and Hamas after weeks of intense negotiations has been hailed as a ‘crucial step’ by UK Foreign Minister David Cameron. Here is how other parts of the world have responded:

Russia: Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told state news agency TASS: ‘Moscow welcomes the four-day ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, something Russia has called for since the conflict escalated.’

China: Beijing has welcomed the deal, saying it hopes it will ‘de-escalate the conflict and ease tensions’.

Germany: Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said on X that the hostage release deal is a ‘breakthrough – even if nothing in the world can undo their suffering.’

European Union: Ursula von der Leyen said she ‘wholeheartedly welcomes’ the agreement, adding that the European Commission will ‘do its utmost to use this pause for a humanitarian surge to Gaza’.

Palestinian Authority: A spokesman for the Fatah-controlled government that oversees parts of the occupied West Bank said: ‘President Abbas and the leadership welcome the humanitarian truce agreement… and renew the call for a comprehensive cessation of the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people’.

• Pictures taken of the Gaza Strip from southern Israel show smoke billowing as Israel continues airstrikes ahead of a temporary truce coming into force.

The UK’s newly appointed Foreign Minister (and former Prime Minister) David Cameron has responded to news of the hostage release deal.

He said in a statement shared by the Foreign Office (FCDO) that the pause in fighting will help much-needed aid to get into Gaza.

President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen has said she welcomes the deal between Israel and Hamas.

I wholeheartedly welcome the agreement reached on the release of the 50 hostages and on a pause in hostilities. Every day these mothers and children are held hostage by terrorists is one too many. I share the joy of the families who can soon embrace their loved ones again. And I am so grateful to all those who have worked tirelessly through diplomatic channels in recent weeks to broker this agreement. I call on the terrorist Hamas to immediately release all hostages and allow them to return home safely.

• Under the terms of the agreement, Hamas is to free 50 women and children it is holding in the Gaza Strip over a four-day period – which would be extended by an additional day for every 10 hostages released, the Israeli government said.

Read the full story here:

• Pictures show Palestinians combing through the rubble of razed buildings after another night of Israeli strikes in the southern Gaza Strip.

• Israel and Hamas have reached a deal aimed at freeing some of the 240 hostages held in Gaza in return for a temporary ceasefire and access for humanitarian aid.
• Under the terms of the agreement, Hamas is to free 50 women and children over a four-day period, during which there will be a pause in fighting.
• While confirming the deal had been agreed upon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the war against Hamas would not stop after the temporary truce.
• Hamas confirmed it had agreed to the deal, citing its responsibility to the people of Gaza ‘to provide relief and heal their wounds’, but warned Israel that ‘our hands will remain on the trigger’.
• After weeks of intense negotiations, the news has been welcomed around the world, with China saying it hopes it will ‘de-escalate the conflict and ease tensions’.