Op-ed: Day 460 of the war

Connecting a hostage deal to a ‘day after’ Gaza mechanism

What’s needed, to state the obvious, is an arrangement under which the hostages can be freed without Hamas leveraging their release to enable its survival

David Horovitz

David Horovitz is the founding editor of The Times of Israel. He is the author of "Still Life with Bombers" (2004) and "A Little Too Close to God" (2000), and co-author of "Shalom Friend: The Life and Legacy of Yitzhak Rabin" (1996). He previously edited The Jerusalem Post (2004-2011) and The Jerusalem Report (1998-2004).

Family members of Liri Albag, held hostage by Hamas, demonstrate in Tel Aviv on January 4, 2025, after the terror group released a video showing signs of life of Albag (Jack Guez / AFP)
Family members of Liri Albag, held hostage by Hamas, demonstrate in Tel Aviv on January 4, 2025, after the terror group released a video showing signs of life of Albag (Jack Guez / AFP)

This Editor’s Note was sent out earlier Wednesday in ToI’s weekly update email to members of the Times of Israel Community. To receive these Editor’s Notes as they’re released, join the ToI Community here.

One cannot begin to imagine the horrors that the 100 hostages held in Gaza, and their families, have been going through — for the whole 460 days of their captivity, but especially when, as in the last few days, hopes for their release rise and fall precipitously.

In mid-December, new Defense Minister Israel Katz was quoted telling MKs that a deal to secure the release of at least some of them was “closer than ever.”

Ten days after that, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was reported telling his aides that there could be no deal because Hamas was refusing to give Israel a list of the names of living hostages.

On Monday, the global news agency Reuters (which had incorrectly reported last month that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was actually “on his way to Cairo” with “a ceasefire deal expected in coming days”), said Hamas had “approved a list of 34 hostages” to be exchanged in a ceasefire deal. Within hours, it had become clear that Hamas had, in fact, merely leaked a partial list of names of hostages that was conveyed to mediators by Israel in July.

That July list had comprised 40 names, five of whom have since been killed in Gaza and a sixth who was rescued by the IDF. The “Hamas-approved list” provided no details of the status of the 34, not even answering the question of who among them is alive — a basic piece of information without which, as Hamas knows full well, no agreement can be reached.

A list of names published on January 6, 2025, by the Saudi al-Sharq purporting to show the 34 hostages who could be released in the first phase of a deal (Screencapture)

On Tuesday, nonetheless, US President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff announced that he was about to head to Qatar, where the latest contacts on an agreement are being held, and declared his belief that the sides were “on the verge” of a deal.

Hamas has all too evidently not been utterly destroyed in Gaza. The last few days have featured a stream of rocket attacks on Israeli communities close to the border, most of them launched from the very areas where the IDF has been concentrating its operations in northern Gaza.

Terribly, 44 soldiers have been killed in the far north of the Strip since the IDF began its ongoing offensive against Hamas there in October. The IDF is playing a deadly cat-and-mouse game against what is now the Hamas guerrilla force, with the much-reduced terror group nonetheless demonstrably capable of attracting, arming and paying new recruits.

Families of hostages held in Gaza display a list of the names of all 100 hostages, demanding that all are released — in contrast to a partial list of 34 hostages recently published in the media — as they stand near the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv, January 7, 2025. The hashtag reads “#untilthelasthostage. (Paulina Patimer / Pro-Democracy Protest movement)

In southern Lebanon, after heavily battering but far from totally destroying Hezbollah, Israel felt able to warily accept a ceasefire in which the Lebanese Army is supposed to deploy as the IDF withdraws, under a supervisory mechanism led by the United States. It’s far from clear whether this arrangement will even play out as intended as the initial 60-day period comes to an end.

In Gaza, there is, of course, no equivalent even to the unreliable Lebanese Army when it comes to filling the vacuum that would be left by an IDF withdrawal. But here, too, a US-led international mechanism would appear to be crucial.

Destruction in a north Gaza neighborhood which the military says had been used as a hideout and command center by senior Hamas commanders in an undated photo released for publication by the military on January 4, 2025. What the IDF says are rocket parts can be seen in the foreground. (Israel Defense Forces)

Israel has radically degraded Hamas, but fears it will reconstitute itself when given breathing space. Hamas is demanding an end to the war and a full IDF withdrawal as a condition for releasing all the hostages. Incoming US president Trump is demanding that the hostages be freed before he takes office on January 20.

What’s needed, to state the obvious, is an arrangement under which the hostages can be freed without Hamas leveraging their release to enable its survival.

Unlike with Lebanon, a US-overseen mechanism for Gaza would require actual international forces on the ground, likely drawn from moderate Arab states, ensuring among other things that aid reaches Gaza civilians rather than the terror groups. In a less constrained version of the Lebanon framework, Israel would be guaranteed full freedom of action as needed to tackle resurgent terrorism.

US President-elect Donald Trump stands behind his incoming Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff during a press conference at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida on January 7, 2025. (Screen capture/YouTube)

Perhaps that is what is quietly being worked on behind the scenes between Israel, the outgoing and incoming US administrations, and other potential partners — a mechanism, that is, that connects and enables a hostage deal, the permanent marginalization of Gaza terrorism, and the beginning of a post-Hamas “day after” in Gaza.

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