Israel, Hamas Agree to a Deal to Pause Fighting in Gaza

My take. Israel's incursion to Gaza has been a massive misfire. What's causing the prospect of peace right now is Iran's diminished status (Syria falling, Hezballah beaten back) and their fear of Trump.

The way to a longer-lasting peace is for Trump to assist Israel in taking a baseball bat to Iran's leadership until they cut the sheet.

Israel, Hamas Agree to a Deal to Pause Fighting in Gaza

The foes struck an agreement they had resisted for months as broader shifts pushed them together

After 15 months of fighting Israel and Hamas have agreed to a cease-fire deal. The deal will begin with an exchange of hostages held in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, according to officials. Photo: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters

By Summer Said, Carrie Keller-Lynn, WSJ

Updated Jan. 15, 2025

Israel and Hamas agreed to a deal to pause their fighting in the Gaza Strip, Arab mediators and an Israeli official said, opening a pathway to end a 15-month war that has laid waste to the enclave, threatened to spark a regional conflict, and roiled politics in the West.

The deal will be implemented in phases, beginning with an exchange of some of the hostages held in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and moving on to talks over a broader end to the fighting.

Those latter talks will likely be contentious, as Israel and Hamas remain at odds over whether there should be a permanent end to the fighting. But the two sides have agreed to look past those differences to close a deal now.

The terms of the agreement aren’t substantially different from those that were available months ago when more Israeli hostages remained alive and before thousands more Palestinians lost their lives. But several factors have pushed the parties closer recently.

Hamas has been battered and isolated by Israeli attacks that took out much of its leadership and cowed its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, and major backer Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, has solidified his governing coalition, reducing the leverage of right-wing parties who have opposed any deal, and has been emboldened by Israel’s wins on the battlefield.

And both sides have been galvanized by President-elect Donald Trump’s imminent return to office. The incoming president said a week ago that “all hell will break out in the Middle East” if the hostages aren’t released by the time he is inaugurated on Jan. 20, repeating a threat he had made earlier. He hasn’t explained what he means, but said last week it wouldn’t be good for Hamas or “frankly, for anyone.”

Negotiators—including Steve Witkoff, Trump’s designated Middle East envoy, along with officials from the U.S., Israel and Arab countries—reconvened at midday local time in Doha, Qatar, to finalize the draft, said Arab officials who are helping mediate the talks.

An official announcement about the deal was expected soon, the mediators said.

Trump pre-empted the official announcement, posting to his social-media service Truth Social: “WE HAVE A DEAL FOR THE HOSTAGES IN THE MIDDLE EAST. THEY WILL BE RELEASED SHORTLY. THANK YOU!”

The first stage of the deal would pause the fighting in Gaza and allow for the release of some Palestinian prisoners held in Israel in exchange for the release of 33 hostages being held in Gaza. The hostages to be released would include women, children, people with severe injuries and those above the age of 50, according to a draft seen by The Wall Street Journal. Hamas would also hand over dead bodies.

The real test for the cease-fire could come after the first 16 days, when the parties will begin debating whether to extend the pause into a permanent end to the fighting over the second and third stages of the deal. These stages would also include the release of all the hostages and eventually a plan to rebuild Gaza.

Previous talks have been undermined by a fundamental disagreement: Israel has wanted to get its hostages back and then continue the war, while Hamas has been loath to release captives without ending the conflict.

Hamas accepted verbal guarantees from the U.S., Qatar, Egypt and Turkey that Israel would continue negotiations for a permanent cease-fire after the expiration of the first phase of the deal, Arab mediators said.

The Israeli and Hamas teams were at the same location but not in the same room, the Arab officials said, adding that messages were being exchanged via the mediators. Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another militant group in Gaza that is also holding some hostages, joined the talks on Wednesday, the officials added.

Israel still doesn’t know how many of the 33 hostages meant to be released in the first stage of the deal are dead, but believes the majority are still alive, Israeli officials said. This means Israel can’t yet say how many Palestinian prisoners will be released because Hamas is asking for more to be released in exchange for living than dead hostages, the officials added.

The release of hostages is expected to be spread out over several weeks at least, the mediators said.

Israeli hospitals and medical teams are preparing to receive the hostages to be released in the deal, many of whom are believed to be in bad condition due to lack of food and hygiene, mistreatment by captors and the risk of Israeli airstrikes.

Far-right members of Netanyahu’s government have publicly denounced the deal, which they say will end Israel’s war in Gaza without uprooting Hamas. But in recent days Netanyahu has made headway toward shoring up support for the deal within his government, even without far-right votes, according to people familiar with the matter.

Netanyahu met Tuesday with families of hostages who have long accused him of failing to give priority to the release of their relatives. Many families are worried about relatives who aren’t included in the first humanitarian stage of the agreement.

The Israeli public increasingly supports the deal, with 60% saying they believed Israel achieved its military objectives in Gaza and should focus on diplomatic efforts to release the hostages, according to a survey this week by Agam Labs at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The fighting in Gaza was triggered by the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, which left around 1,200 dead and some 250 people taken hostage. More than 46,000 people have been killed in Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities, who don’t say how many were combatants.

Israel says 94 hostages taken on Oct. 7, 2023, remain in Gaza, most of them Israeli. They include dual nationals and more than 30 hostages who Israel has concluded are no longer alive, based on intelligence findings, but Israeli and U.S. officials privately believe the number of dead is much higher. Four additional hostages, taken before the Hamas-led attack, bring the total to 98.

As part of the proposed agreement, Israeli forces would remain in some parts of Gaza when the fighting stops but would eventually withdraw from the corridor along Gaza’s border with Egypt and another that bisects the Gaza Strip. Hamas agreed to put off resolving some differences with Israel to the second phase of the deal, including over the buffer zones Israel wants to maintain along the eastern and northern edges of Gaza, Arab mediators said.

The militant group also agreed that Palestinians released from long jail terms would leave the Palestinian territories and live in exile abroad with their families.