Tel Aviv [Israel], October 4 (ANI/TPS): A senior Israeli official has told Israeli Channel 12 News that the hostages could be free within a few days, if the talks in Cairo aimed at finalising the details of Hamas’s release of hostages proceed without any problems.
The same source told Channel 12 that the talks are set to begin tomorrow or on Monday and will be attended by Hamas and Israeli delegations, as well as US Special Middle East Envoy Hady Amr and possibly President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
The senior official, whose name was not disclosed, said that the current rapid developments had been ‘fully coordinated’ between President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The two leaders spoke on the phone, he explained, prior to the US President’s public statement, in which he declared his belief that Hamas is ‘ready for peace’ and called on Israel to ‘immediately stop the bombing of Gaza so that we can safely and quickly retrieve the hostages’.
The source says the 72-hour deadline for Hamas to release all the hostages will begin as soon as the “technical talks” in Egypt are completed, although the 72-hours “might be extended a little in order for Hamas to locate all the slain hostages. Hamas officials have said the 72-hour window is “unrealistic” bercause it will take longer to locate all the slain hostages.
According to the source, the timing of the Trump plan gives Israel a ‘huge advantage’, since Israel will regain the hostages while the IDF remains in most of Gaza and as negotiations on future steps are conducted. (ANI/TPS)