2023-11-26 00:28:06
by Davide Frattini
Among those released were four Thais after hectic hours in which Biden’s intervention prevented the pact from falling apart. 39 Palestinians gathered in Ofer prison regain their freedom
FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
TEL AVIV — When you’ve been waiting 50 days, seven more hours may seem like a short time. Instead they are the ones that overwhelm the waiting family members, already exhausted by the name lottery imposed by the Hamas terrorists. They are pushing us into an inhuman situation, mutters a woman who has four relatives held prisoner. Even worse for those who yesterday received the phone call that everyone is waiting for, the announcement that the loved ones were on the list provided by the fundamentalists in Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, another 13 women and minors in the second exchange of the agreement.
As the sun set over the Negev desert, the jihadist leaders decided to leave everyone in the dark. The negotiators’ private plane had landed from Qatar in Tel Aviv well before 4 pm, the time set for the start of the complex operation. It means that the delay in the release was already circulating in the dusty air of Gaza, that Yahya Sinwar, the leader of leaders, had decided to force the hand and accuse the Israelis of not having respected the agreement in order to (perhaps) gain a few days more truce than the four established: few of the 200 aid trucks could have reached the north (the Red Crescent seems to declare the opposite), the release of Palestinian prisoners should have been based on the number of years spent in prison and on Friday it was not it was like this.
In Tel Aviv, one hundred thousand people demonstrate to demand the release of all those kidnapped at any cost, of which at least 210 remain.
The tension
The initial desperation in Piazza dei Dispersi, as it was renamed, had multiplied in the tension on the twelfth floor of the Kirya, the white cube not far away, where the General Staff and the small war council are gathered. Who had decided to threaten the fundamentalist leaders: you have until midnight or the generals will order bombing. Egyptian secret service agents arrive at the border post. They are the ones who resolve the stalemate together with Joe Biden, the American president, who speaks with the emir of Qatar. At 11pm local time, the handover of the kidnapped to the Red Cross, from there towards Egypt and then the Kerem Shalom crossing where the helicopters await to take them to hospitals, 4 Thais were also freed in a parallel negotiation.
The hostages who eventually returned home almost all came from Kibbutz Be’eri, devastated in the attacks of October 7, with a total of 1,200 Israelis killed. Shoshan Haran, daughter Adi and her children Naveh, 8, and Yael (3) with Sharon Avigdori and daughter Noam, 12, are part of an extended family and had been taken away from the party which was also attended by the Italian-Israelis Eviatar Kipnis and Lilach Kipnis, both killed.
The missing one
The brothers Noam and Alma Or had been kidnapped with their father, still held in Gaza, and their mother murdered. Also free are Emily Hand – she turned 9 alone in captivity – and Hila Rotem, 12. Noga Weiss, 18, with her mother Shiri. The father considered missing. Maya Regev, 21, was kidnapped at the Re’im rave with her brother Itay, still a prisoner. The pact mediated by Qatar together with the United States and Egypt provides for the exchange of 50 women and minors for 150 Palestinian prisoners, again women and minors, in addition to the ceasefire and the entry into the territory controlled by Hamas of medicines, food , fuel. The deaths in the Strip are almost 15 thousand, the health system has collapsed, epidemics are spreading due to the lack of drinking water.
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November 25, 2023 (modified November 25, 2023 | 11.27pm)
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