The release of the Gaza hostages is expected “early Monday morning,” declared Shosh Bedrosian, spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, this Sunday, October 12.
“The release of our hostages will begin early Monday morning. We hope that our 20 live hostages will be released together. [et remis tous] at the same time to the Red Cross and transported in six to eight vehicles,” Shosh Bedrosian said during a press conference.
US Vice President JD Vance had stated shortly before that the hostages could be released “at any time.”
Israel is ready to receive the hostages “immediately”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his country was willing to “immediately” take in all hostages held in Palestinian territory, two days after the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas came into effect on Friday.
The first step of Donald Trump’s plan to end the war, the return to Israel of the 48 hostages, dead or alive, must be accompanied by Israel’s release of 250 security detainees, including many convicted of deadly anti-Israel attacks, and 1,700 Palestinians detained in the Gaza Strip since October 2023.
However, a government official said on Sunday that Israel would only release the Palestinian detainees after confirming that all hostages had been returned.
Almost all of them were kidnapped during the bloody Hamas attack on Israeli soil on October 7, 2023, which sparked the war in Gaza.
Hamas excluded from future government
In parallel with the already begun withdrawal of the Israeli army, the US plan foresees in a later phase that Hamas would be excluded from the future government of the Gaza Strip and that its arsenal would be destroyed.
A source within the Palestinian Islamist movement said on Sunday that Hamas had renounced any role in a future government in Gaza, where it took power in 2007.
Until Saturday, Israeli hospitals that had treated hostages during previous liberations were preparing for various scenarios.
“Miracles exist”
The Israeli prison administration, for its part, said it had transferred Palestinian prisoners to two specific prisons with a view to their release.
“The agreement is not simple but it is a historic moment,” commented Israeli President Isaac Herzog, present on Sunday in Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square.
“Miracles exist, the hostages are coming home,” declared US envoy Steve Witkoff on Saturday in this same square, which has become the nerve center of the mobilization to obtain the release of the hostages.
Source: BFM TV
