Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the long-awaited cease-fire deal slated to begin Sunday morning will be put on hold unless Hamas shares the names of the first hostages to be released.
“We will be unable to move forward with the framework until we receive the list of the hostages who will be released, as was agreed,” Netanyahu said late Saturday.
“Israel will not tolerate violations of the agreement. Hamas is solely responsible.”
Bruce Hoffman, an expert with the US Council on Foreign Relations, told The Post the 11th-hour snag could ultimately derail the fragile accord. “One has to ask if Hamas isn’t deliberately sabotaging the deal,” he said.
“This is what they agreed to. It seemed the most basic of all the demands by the Israelis.”
Arab media, however, reported the terror group would comply and “hand over its list of prisoners it will release within hours.”
The cease-fire-for-hostage deal is scheduled to go into effect at 8:30 a.m. local time Sunday, or 1:30 a.m. ET, Qatari officials announced earlier Saturday.
The Israeli military confirmed the start time and said its troops were ready to “implement the operational procedures in the field in accordance with the set agreements.”
President-elect Trump, in an interview with NBC News, said the deal “better hold.”
“If they respect us, it will hold. If they don’t respect us, all hell will break out,” Trump said.
He added he told Netanyahu, “Just keep doing what you have to do. You have to have — this has to end. We want it to end, but to keep doing what has to be done.”
The cease-fire plan, which would see Israeli hostages exchanged for Palestinian prisoners as well as a pause in fighting in the 15-month war, was approved by Israel’s cabinet early Saturday morning, following hours of intense deliberations. The deal was then inked by Israel’s national security advisor.
The first phase of the three-stage deal, which would encompass a six-week pause in fighting, would see 33 Israeli hostages exchanged for the release of nearly 1,900 Palestinian prisoners. Israeli captives who are set to be released during the first phase, alive or dead, include women, children, and men over 50.
According to the deal Israeli leaders greenlit Saturday, the first hostage exchange is scheduled to begin at 4 p.m. local time, or 9 a.m. New York time, with three female hostages to be released, followed by another four captives released a week later, and the remaining 26 freed over a five-week period.
During each swap, Israel will release Palestinian prisoners after the hostages arrive home safe.
Also during the first phase, Israeli troops will pull back to a buffer zone in Gaza near the border with the Jewish state, while trucks carrying much-needed humanitarian aid including food and medical supplies are to flood the decimated territory.
In a 10-minute video message released late Saturday, Netanyahu said Israel had the support of the United States to resume fighting in Gaza if the two sides couldn’t hammer out their sticking points for the subsequent stages of the cease-fire deal, including Israel’s complete military withdrawal from the Palestinian territory and Hamas releasing all of the remaining hostages before then.
“Both President Trump and President Biden gave full backing to Israel’s right to return to fighting if Israel concludes that the negotiations on the second phase are going nowhere,” he said, according to the Times of Israel.
“If we do have to resume fighting, we will do so in new ways and with very great power,” he thundered.
Earlier Saturday, the Jewish state fended off a missile attack fired from Yemen Saturday. The Iran-backed Houthi terror group claimed responsibility for the attack, which it said had targeted the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv.
“The missile hit its target with high accuracy, thanks be to Allah,” a Houthi spokesman said.
The IDF said the projectiles were intercepted by its air defense systems.
Israel, meanwhile, continued to bombard the Palestinian enclave Saturday, with tanks shelling in Gaza City while fighter jets blasted central and southern Gaza. At least 123 Palestinians were killed by Israeli troops since news of the cease-fire deal broke Wednesday, according to the Palestinian Civil Emergency Service.
Hamas sparked the bloody war after launching a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, with the terror group and its allies killing 1,200 people and taking another 250 captive. An estimated 97 hostages remain, with an estimated 60 believed to be alive.
Israel responded to the deadliest attack in the nation’s history with a ground offensive in Gaza, bombarding the enclave and killing over 46,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, who do not distinguish between civilian and military deaths.
On Saturday, the US also announced that it would donate $117 million for security assistance to Lebanon as Beirut seeks to implement the tenuous cease-fire agreement announced in November between Israel and the Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah.
The assistance to the war-rattled nation will help Lebanon’s armed forces and security forces “as they work to assert Lebanese sovereignty across the country,” a US State Department spokesperson said.
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