An agreement to extend the truce agreement in return for a prisoner exchange between the Palestinian Resistance Hamas and the Israeli occupation, which was mediated by Egypt and Qatar, has been officially reached on Monday eveningt.
According to media reports, Hamas confirmed that a 2-day extension was agreed upon with Cairo and Doha under the same terms as the previous truce.
A spokesperson of the Qatari Foreign Ministry also announced that the agreement was reached “as part of the ongoing mediation” by Doha.
Meanwhile, prior to the announcment that a deal was reached, the head of Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS) said a brokered truce extension would include the release of 20 Israeli captives held by the Palestinian Resistance, in exchange for 60 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
The original agreement, which went into effect on Friday and was scheduled to expire by early Tuesday morning, stipulates the liberation of 150 Palestinians in exchange for the Resistance releasing 50 Israeli captives.
On his part, the European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said a deal to renew the temporary ceasefire is within reach and could open the way for the international community to work on a political solution to the war.
However, as expressed by a number of world top officials and leading human rights organizations, a temporary truce is insufficient to end the suffering of the people in Gaza under the Israeli brutal war, which saw a 50-day-long blockade on basic life necessities, daily massacres, the destruction of entire residential areas, and forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of now homeless civilians.
As per the latest data released by the Palestinian Health Ministry, 16,000 Palestinians were martyred in the Israeli aggression on Gaza, over half of whom are children and women, and over 32,000 were wounded.
