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Hamas has handed over 13 Israeli captives and four foreign nationals to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) after a delay of several hours as the group claimed that Israel had violated the terms of a truce.

The impasse was resolved following mediation by Qatar and Egypt on Saturday, the second day of the pause in hostilities in the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Israel is now expected to release 39 Palestinian prisoners from its jails.

Majed al-Ansari, a spokesperson for Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in a post on X that 13 Israelis and four foreign nationals had been handed over to the ICRC.

They were on their way to the Rafah border crossing between southern Gaza and Egypt before travelling to Israel.

Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari updated that 13 Israeli captives and four Thai nationals were with the ICRC and were on their way to the border crossing known as Kerem Shalom, or Karam Abu Salem.

The convoy “returning to Israel” is making its way through Egyptian territory, he said.

Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut, reporting from East Jerusalem, said the Israeli military confirmed “just moments ago” that Hamas had handed over the captives to the ICRC.

“They will then be handed over to the Israeli military. They will be taken to an airbase in southern Israel for an initial check where they will then be flown to several different hospitals throughout the Tel Aviv area for additional medical and psychological checks,” she said.

Hamas spokesperson Osama Hamdan had said earlier that the aid deliveries permitted by Israel had fallen short of what had been promised and were not reaching northern Gaza, which was the target of Israel’s offensive.

Only 65 of 340 aid trucks that had entered Gaza since Friday had reached northern Gaza, which was “less than half of what Israel agreed on”, Hamdan said from Beirut.

The Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, earlier said Israel had failed to respect the terms of the Palestinian prisoner release.

Qadura Fares, the Palestinian commissioner for prisoners, said Israel had not released detainees by seniority, as was expected.

Israel has said 50 trucks with food, water, shelter equipment and medical supplies had deployed to northern Gaza under United Nations supervision, the first significant aid delivery there since the start of the war seven weeks ago.

The row over the second swap of captives for prisoners quashed hopes after 13 Israeli women and children were freed by Hamas on Friday. Some 39 Palestinian women and teenagers were released from Israeli jails.

Israel’s military spokesman, Daniel Hagari, said the government was committed to complying with the truce agreement with Hamas but that there were many parties and factors involved. “And every day brings with it its complexities,” he added.

Hagari pointed to the remarkable progress in efforts to release the captives.

Yet, at least two Palestinians were reported to have been killed by the Israeli military and 11 wounded as they attempted the trip to northern Gaza on Friday.

A large number of displaced people were trying to return home across Gaza as the four-day truce brokered by Qatar took effect on Friday. However, Israel has warned people that they will not be allowed to enter the north of the war-torn enclave.

Truce extension?

Before the snag in the latest hostages-to-prisoners exchange, Egypt, which controls the Rafah border crossing through which aid supplies have resumed into southern Gaza, said it had received “positive signals” from all parties over a possible extension to the pause in fighting.

Diaa Rashwan, the head of Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS), said in a statement that Cairo was holding extensive talks with all parties to reach an agreement that would mean “the release of more detainees in Gaza and Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails”.

Israel has said the truce could be extended if Hamas continues to release hostages at a rate of at least 10 per day. A Palestinian source has said up to 100 hostages could go free.

For now, 50 of about 240 hostages are to be exchanged for 150 Palestinian prisoners over four days under the truce, the first halt in fighting since Hamas attacked southern Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people.

Israel has pledged to destroy Hamas, raining bombs and shells on the enclave and launching a ground offensive in the north. Israel’s relentless bombardment has killed more than 14,800 people, roughly 40 percent of them children, Palestinian health authorities said on Saturday.

The current Israel-Palestinian conflict has seen 47 days of air attacks on the Gaza Strip, nearly 15,000 Palestinians killed, 1,200 Israelis dead, and continuing raids and arrests by the Israeli army in the occupied West Bank.

There has also been an increase in Israeli settler attacks on Palestinian communities throughout the occupied territories.

Is now really the best time to restart discussions about the elusive two-state solution for Israel and Palestine?

International calls have begun to grow louder to pursue this. But what are the red lines for both sides, and what would a return to the 1967 borders look like in reality?

Presenter: James Bays

Guests:

Alon Liel – Former director general of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a former Israeli ambassador to South Africa and formerly part of an Israeli campaign to advance recognition of a Palestinian state by other governments

Phyllis Bennis – Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and international adviser to Jewish Voice for Peace and author of, Understanding the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: A Primer

Mustafa Barghouti – Secretary-general of the Palestinian National Initiative and a former information minister for the Palestinian Authority

Current pause brings little respite after 15,000 Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks during seven weeks of war.

Central London was packed with tens of thousands of people who turned out to demand a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

The National March for Palestine on Saturday took place on the second day of a truce between Israel and Hamas, which has seen the release of hostages held by the Palestinian group since October 7 and Palestinians jailed in Israel.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign estimated a turnout of 300,000 people calling for “an end to the siege of Gaza”.

Protests and solidarity marches have been held in London and cities across the world since the start of the Israel-Palestine conflict seven weeks back.

The Metropolitan Police said at least five people were arrested on suspicion of inciting racial hatred, including for distributing “literature featuring a swastika inside a Star of David”.

The force said 1,500 officers were deployed to police the march.

Officers are at the forming up point of today’s protest.

They have been handing out leaflets to provide clarity on offences and behaviour that won’t be tolerated. pic.twitter.com/NcyhTakPCy

— Metropolitan Police (@metpoliceuk) November 25, 2023

Officers also handed out leaflets at the march “to provide clarity on offences and behaviour that won’t be tolerated”, police said.

The peaceful protesters carried banners that read, “Ceasefire Now!” and “Stop the War on Gaza”.

This month, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak sacked Home Secretary Suella Braverman, who drew anger for accusing police of being too lenient with pro-Palestinian protesters. She also made unauthorised comments about the country’s pro-Palestine demonstrations, which she called “hate marches”.

 

The guns indeed fell silent exactly at 7am (05:00 GMT) on Friday. The transition from loud explosions to a sudden calm that the Gaza Strip has not seen in seven weeks was quite eerie.

Right up to the top of the hour, Israeli forces appeared to be taking advantage of every last minute to keep bombing and their Hamas opponents hit back as much as they could.

To everyone’s relief, both sides stopped shooting right on cue. Not a shot was heard as the fighters took a much-needed respite.

All hopes now are that the pause will hold as intended and the ambitious plans for the 96 hours of uneasy truce will be carried out.

A column of Israeli armoured vehicles headed towards Israel, taking soldiers home for short chance to recover. They were not being fired at, so crews stood in open hatches or allowed themselves the luxury of sitting on the vehicles’ steel bodies, basking in the morning sun, obviously trusting the pause and not showing signs of anxiety or fear. Many smiled, demonstrating clear relief, as the plan looked like it was working.

Palestinian fighters also headed outdoors. Many changed into civilian clothes and rushed south to see family members and check who survived the intense bombardment and indiscriminate shelling.

Reporters saw aid agencies not waste a second, the first trucks carrying much-needed supplies crossing the Rafah checkpoint from Egypt minutes after Zero Hour. One hundred crossed into the Gaza Strip on day one, and more are scheduled.

Intricate exchange

The first real test, the late afternoon exchange of 13 Israeli captives held by Hamas for 39 Palestinians imprisoned in Israel, 24 women and 15 teenage boys, also passed smoothly.

Proving how sensitive the affair is, and fully aware of the possibility that a minor glitch could delay or even stop the planned exchanges, the two sides opted not to handle the logistics directly. Instead, they chose the safest approach, using intermediaries and, in the case of Israeli captives, going through an indirect route.

Hamas first handed 13 Israeli captives to the representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross/Red Crescent (ICRC), who took them across the border into Egypt in a convoy of vehicles, handing them over to Egyptian authorities.

Egyptian “possession” was very brief, as all Israelis were quickly transferred to their country’s secret service, Shin Bet, who flew them by helicopter first to a military base in the Naqab Desert (also called Negev), and then to civilian hospitals where they were reunited with their families.

But this captive release procedure with all its intricacies was not Friday’s first. About half an hour before the liberation of Israeli captives, another group unexpectedly served as proof-of-concept: 10 citizens of Thailand and one Filipino were released, under the same procedures that would be used for the most anticipated group.

The Thai captive deal was apparently negotiated separately, with Egypt as an intermediary. The suddenness with which it surfaced out of complete secrecy proves the nature of the complex negotiations for the release of the captives.

Israel released 39 Palestinian prisoners in a much simpler procedure – no go-betweens or roundabouts: the women and teenagers had first been transferred to Israel’s Ofer prison in the occupied West Bank. At the agreed time, the gates opened, and they were released to their waiting families and then on to East Jerusalem where thousands of Palestinians joined in an impromptu emotional celebration of their return to freedom.

Seeing with different eyes

At the same time, most Israelis were anxiously watching live coverage of the return of the first batch of their compatriots.

An Israeli colleague told me on Saturday that it was only when his family realised how stressed and worried they had been during the seven weeks of collective concern for the captives that they thought of the Palestinians’ anxiety for their own, held for many years. “After this, we may see them with different eyes”, he said.

There was no doubt that both sides were overwhelmed by emotions and some observers hoped that the realisation of how much pain both societies are in might somehow bring them together after the war ends.

But the good news of civilians being set free was marred by less-publicised news of others being killed in spite of the fighting being on pause.

While the two militaries refrained from shooting at each other as agreed, the Israelis demonstrated that, in their mind, the truce extends only to the two armed sides.

Israeli forces confronted hundreds of Palestinian civilians trying to return to their homes in north Gaza during the pause. They were defying Israeli orders to remain in the south, distributed in the media and air-dropped leaflets, and Israeli soldiers fired at them.

Two people killed and 11 wounded by direct, aimed, assault-rifle fire is a sad reminder that, as welcome as it is now, the agreed pause has its definite limits, in duration and in scope and a warning against getting euphoric and too hopeful too soon.

United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon condemns attack as ‘deeply troubling’, no troops were injured.

The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon has said that Israeli fire hit one of its patrols in the country’s south, despite a truce between Israel and Hamas largely quietening the Lebanon-Israel frontier.

“At around 12:00 pm, a UNIFIL patrol was hit by [Israeli army] gunfire” in the vicinity of Aitarun, the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon said in a statement on Saturday.

“No peacekeepers were injured, but the vehicle was damaged,” it said, adding that “this incident occurred during a period of relative calm” along the border between Israel and Lebanon.

Since the Israel-Palestine conflict began on October 7, the frontier between Lebanon and Israel has seen intensifying exchanges of fire, mainly between Israel and Shia movement Hezbollah, but also Palestinian groups, raising fears of a broader conflagration.

The scope of the border fighting has gradually increased over the weeks, but it has not turned into an all-out war yet. At first, the two sides started hitting each other with artillery attacks, and Israel also brought in its drones.

A four-day truce between Israel and Hamas began on Friday, and a source close to Hezbollah told the AFP news agency that the Iran-backed group would also adhere to the truce if Israel did.

UNIFIL said “this attack on peacekeepers, dedicated to reducing tensions and restoring stability in south Lebanon, is deeply troubling,” adding, “we condemn this act.”

Today at around 12 pm, a UNIFIL patrol was hit by IDF gunfire in the vicinity of Aytaroun, in southern Lebanon.

No peacekeepers were injured, but the vehicle was damaged. This incident occurred during a period of relative calm along the Blue Line.

— UNIFIL (@UNIFIL_) November 25, 2023

Last month, shelling lightly wounded a UN peacekeeper near the border village of Hula, just hours after UNIFIL said a shell hit its headquarters in Naqura near the Israel-Lebanon border.

The force said it was investigating those incidents.

“We strongly remind the parties of their obligations to protect peacekeepers and avoid putting the men and women who are working to restore stability at risk,” Saturday’s UNIFIL statement said.

Cross-border fire has killed 109 people in Lebanon, including 77 Hezbollah fighters and 14 civilians, three of them journalists, according to an AFP count.

Six Israeli soldiers and three civilians have been killed on the Israeli side, according to the authorities.

Even as many Lebanese may feel for the plight of Palestinians, they also fear getting entangled in a new conflict, many having already experienced the 2006 war in which more than 1,200 people were killed in Lebanon, many of them civilians. At least 165 Israelis were also killed.

Since the pause went into effect on Friday, calm has largely returned to Lebanon’s southern border.

UNIFIL was set up in 1978 to monitor the withdrawal of Israeli forces after they invaded Lebanon in reprisal for a Palestinian attack.

It was bolstered after the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006, and its roughly 10,000 peacekeepers are tasked with monitoring the ceasefire between the two sides.