Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that Israel and Hamas are “very shortly expected to maneuver into the second phase of the ceasefire,” after Hamas returns the stays of the last hostage held in Gaza.
Netanyahu spoke during a news conference with visiting German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and stressed that the second phase, which addresses the disarming of Hamas and the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, could begin as soon as the top of the month.
Hamas has yet at hand over the stays of Ran Gvili, a 24-year-old police officer who was killed within the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack that sparked the conflict. His body was taken to Gaza.
The ceasefire’s second stage also includes the deployment of a global force to secure Gaza and forming a brief Palestinian government to run day-to-day affairs under the supervision of a global board led by U.S. President Donald Trump.
A senior Hamas official on Sunday told The Associated Press the group is able to discuss “freezing or storing or laying down” its weapons as a part of the ceasefire in a possible approach to one of the difficult issues ahead.
Netanyahu says second phase will likely be difficult
Netanyahu said few people believed the ceasefire’s first stage may very well be achieved, and the second phase is just as difficult.
“As I discussed to the chancellor, there’s a 3rd phase, and that’s to deradicalize Gaza, something that also people believed was inconceivable. But it surely was done in Germany, it was done in Japan, it was done within the Gulf States. It could actually be done in Gaza, too, but after all Hamas needs to be dismantled,” he said.
The return of Gvili’s stays — and Israel’s return of 15 bodies of Palestinians in exchange — would complete the primary phase of Trump’s 20-point ceasefire plan.
Hamas says it has not been capable of reach all stays because they’re buried under rubble left by Israel’s two-year offensive in Gaza. Israel has accused the militants of stalling and threatened to resume military operations or withhold humanitarian aid if all stays should not returned.
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A bunch of families of hostages said in a press release that “we cannot advance to the following phase before Ran Gvili returns home.”
Meanwhile, Israeli military Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on Sunday called the so-called Yellow Line that divides the Israeli-controlled majority of Gaza from the remainder of the territory a “latest border.”
“We now have operational control over extensive parts of the Gaza Strip and we’ll remain on those defense lines,” Zamir said. “The Yellow Line is a brand new border line, serving as a forward defensive position for our communities and a line of operational activity.”
Germany says support for Israel is unchanged
Merz said Germany, one among Israel’s closest allies, is assisting with the implementation of the second phase by sending officers and diplomats to a U.S.-led civilian and military coordination center in southern Israel, and by sending humanitarian aid to Gaza.
The chancellor also said Germany still believes that a two-state-solution is the perfect possible option but that “the German federal government stays of the opinion that recognition of a Palestinian state can only come at the top of such a process, not originally.”
The U.S.-drafted plan for Gaza leaves the door open to Palestinian independence. Netanyahu has long asserted that making a Palestinian state would reward Hamas and eventually result in an excellent larger Hamas-run state on Israel’s borders.
Netanyahu also said that while he would really like to go to Germany, he hasn’t planned a diplomatic trip because he is worried about an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court, the U.N.’s top war crimes court, last yr in reference to the conflict in Gaza.
Merz said there are currently no plans for a visit but he may invite Netanyahu in the longer term. He added that he isn’t aware of future sanctions against Israel from the European Union nor any plans to renew German bans on military exports to Israel.
Germany had a brief ban on exporting military equipment to Israel, which was lifted after the ceasefire began on Oct. 10.
Israel kills militant in Gaza
The Israeli military said it killed a militant who approached its troops across the Yellow Line.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says Israeli forces have killed greater than 370 Palestinians because the start of the ceasefire, and that the bodies of six people killed in attacks had been delivered to local hospitals over the past 24 hours.
In the unique Hamas-led attack in 2023, the militants killed around 1,200 people and took greater than 250 others hostage. Just about all the hostages or their stays have been returned in ceasefires or other deals.
Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed no less than 70,360 Palestinians, in keeping with Gaza’s Health Ministry, which operates under the Hamas-run government. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants, but says that almost half the dead have been women and youngsters. The ministry is a component of Gaza’s Hamas government and its numbers are considered reliable by the U.N. and other international bodies.
—Grieshaber reported from Berlin.
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