{"id":53635,"date":"2025-03-02T01:52:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-02T01:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gulftimes.ae\/israel-approves-temporary-extension-of-gaza-ceasefire\/"},"modified":"2025-03-02T01:52:00","modified_gmt":"2025-03-02T01:52:00","slug":"israel-approves-temporary-extension-of-gaza-ceasefire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gulftimes.ae\/?p=53635","title":{"rendered":"Israel approves temporary extension of Gaza ceasefire"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Reuters<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Israeli soldiers stand on a tank on the Israeli side of the border with the Gaza Strip. Photo: February 2025<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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The Israeli government has approved a temporary extension of the Gaza ceasefire for the next six weeks, covering the Muslim Ramadan and Jewish Passover periods. <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office made the announcement shortly after the first phase of the previously agreed ceasefire expired at midnight on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Netanyahu’s office said that under a ceasefire proposal by US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff, half of the hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza – both alive and dead – would be released on the first day. <\/p>\n
The remaining hostages would be freed “if an agreement on a permanent ceasefire is reached”.<\/p>\n
Hamas has not publicly commented on the latest Israeli move.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The Israeli government backed the ceasefire extension after a four-hour meeting called by Netanyahu.<\/p>\n
The prime minister’s office claimed that Hamas “has so far refused” to back the Witkoff plan, adding that Israel would immediately start negotiations if the group changed its position.<\/p>\n
The US envoy’s plan envisages that Israel could return to fighting after 42 days if it believed negotiations on a second phase had failed.<\/p>\n
On Friday night, Hamas said it would not agree to any extension of phase one without guarantees from American, Qatari and Egyptian mediators that phase two would eventually take place.<\/p>\n
Hamas seems determined to remain a force in Gaza, even if it might be willing to hand over day-to-day governance to other Palestinian actors, including the Palestinian Authority in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the BBC’s Paul Adams reports from Jerusalem.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
Palestinians in Gaza are struggling to put their lives back together in the current, fragile peace<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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The first phase of the ceasefire that came into force on 19 January expired on Saturday.<\/p>\n
It halted 15 months of fighting between Hamas and the Israeli military, allowing the release of 33 Israeli and five Thai hostages for about 1,900 Palestinian prisoners and detainees.<\/p>\n
But negotiations on phase two, including the release of all remaining living hostages and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, have barely begun.<\/p>\n
There are believed to be 24 hostages alive, with another 39 presumed to be dead.<\/p>\n
Hamas carried out an unprecedented attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, killing about 1,200 people and taking another 251 hostage.<\/p>\n
Israel responded with an air and ground campaign in the Gaza Strip, during which at least 48,365 people have been killed, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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