Lorenzo Tondo

Benjamin Netanyahu said both US president-elect Donald Trump and US president Joe Biden had stressed that Israel can return to fighting in Gaza if the next stages of the deal are not realized.

Israel will not rest until “all of its war goals are completed”, he said, which includes the return of every single hostage being held in Gaza.

The prime minister says the US has promised Israel will have the weaponry it needs to return to fighting if necessary, and will do so “in new ways and with very great power”.

Benjamin Netanyahu said that the first stage of the ceasefire deal was temporary, adding: “If we must return to fighting, we will do that in new, forceful ways.”

Netanyahu, who also said that Israel’s “campaign is not over yet”, added that both Donald Trump and Joe Biden back Israel’s “right to resume fighting if the second stage is fruitless”.

The Israeli prime minister’s comments on Saturday evening come as a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is set to take place on Sunday at 6.30 GMT.

As part of the deal, 33 of the 98 remaining Israeli hostages kidnapped by Hamas are expected to be freed in this phase, according to Reuters. In exchange, Israel will release approximately 2,000 Palestinians currently detained across multiple prisons.

In a new statement on Saturday, Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel will not go forth with the ceasefire deal until it receives a list of the 33 hostages kidnapped by Hamas in the first phase of the deal.

“We will not move forward with the agreement until we receive the list of hostages who will be released, as agreed. Israel will not tolerate violations of the agreement. The sole responsibility lies with Hamas,” Netanyahu said.

Thirty-three of the 98 remaining Israeli hostages kidnapped by Hamas are expected to be freed in this phase, according to Reuters. In exchange, Israel will release approximately 2,000 Palestinians currently detained across multiple prisons.

It is approaching 6pm in Gaza City and Tel Aviv. Here is a summary of the latest updates from today’s live blog:

• The Gaza ceasefire will come into effect at 8.30am Gaza time (6.30am GMT) on Sunday 19 January, Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesperson said. Under the ceasefire agreement, the three-stage truce starts with an initial six-week phase when hostages held by Hamas will be exchanged for prisoners and detainees jailed in Israel.

• The government announced the approval after 1am Saturday, Jerusalem time, following a six-hour meeting of the full cabinet that went well past the beginning of the Jewish sabbath, a rare occurrence and a reflection of the moment’s importance.

• News of the ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas has been greeted with joy by Palestinians but a more wary approach in Israel, where demonstrators both in favour and against the deal have taken to the streets.

• Thirty-three of the 98 remaining Israeli hostages – including women, children, men over 50 and ill and wounded captives – are to be freed in this phase, as Reuters reports. In return, Israel will release almost 2,000 Palestinians from its jails. They include 737 male, female and teenage prisoners, some of whom are members of Palestinian militant groups convicted of attacks that killed dozens of Israelis, as well as hundreds of Palestinians from Gaza in detention since the start of the war. The Israeli justice ministry published their details early on Saturday, along with the ceasefire agreement, which said 30 Palestinian prisoners would be released for each female hostage on Sunday.

• Hamas said on Saturday that the mechanism of the release of Israeli hostages it holds in Gaza would depend on the number of Palestinian prisoners Israel would free. Hamas also said on Saturday that Israel had “failed to achieve its aggressive goals” in Gaza. The group said in statement that Israel “only succeeded in committing war crimes that disgrace the dignity of humanity.”

• Hezbollah leader, Naim Qassem, congratulated Palestinians on Saturday for the Gaza ceasefire deal, saying it proved the “persistence of resistance” against Israel in his first comments since Israel and Hamas reached the accord on Wednesday. Qassem also said that the Hezbollah’s war with Israel in Lebanon had contributed in “Gaza’s victory”, according to Reuters.

• A spokesperson for al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, has said that the group is making final arrangements for the release of captives. However, they warned that intensified Israeli bombing could put their lives at risk.

• The Israeli military said it intercepted two missiles fired from Yemen on Saturday. The military activated air raid sirens in Jerusalem and in parts of central and southern Israel ahead of the interceptions during the day, with the first projectile shot down in the morning. Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed the morning attack, saying they had targeted Israel’s defence ministry. On Friday, the Houthi rebels warned they would keep up their attacks if Israel did not respect the terms of the ceasefire with Hamas.

• Israel’s military offensive on the Gaza Strip has killed at least 46,899 Palestinians and injured 110,725 since 7 October 2023, the Gaza health ministry said in an update on Saturday. The ministry statement said that 23 Palestinians were killed and 83 were injured over the past 24 hours. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

• On Saturday, Agence France-Presse (AFP) photos showed Palestinians in the southern city of Khan Younis mourning four members of a family killed in an Israeli strike. On Friday, Gaza’s civil defence rescue agency said that Israeli bombardment had killed at least 113 Palestinians, after Israel’s military reported hitting about 50 targets in 24 hours.

• Israel is expected to receive the names, later this afternoon, of the first three hostages to be released, the Times of Israel reported, citing the Kan public broadcaster. According to the Kan report, Hamas will give the names to Qatar, who will then inform the Mossad director, David Barnea. Barnea would then inform the families.

• Israeli police said that several people were injured in a shooting in Tel Aviv on Saturday, while emergency service providers reported that one person was injured by stabbing. “There are injuries at the scene, and at this stage, large police forces are on their way to the location. The circumstances are currently unclear,” the police said in a statement, adding the incident occurred on Levontin Street.

• Eight people have been arrested at a pro-Palestine rally in central London, as hundreds gathered amid a heavy police presence. The rally comes after police curtailed organisers’ plans for a march past the BBC and near a synagogue and it was adjusted to be a static rally in Whitehall instead. A pro-Israel counter-rally also took place in Whitehall on Saturday.

• Lebanon’s new president, Joseph Aoun, stressed to UN secretary-general, António Guterres, on Saturday the urgency of an Israeli military withdrawal as stipulated by a ceasefire deal that ended the Israel-Hezbollah war in November. According to Reuters, Guterres said he would “exert utmost efforts” to ensure the secure withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon within the set deadline.

• The Palestine Red Cross Society (PRCS) welcomed the news of a ceasefire deal in the Gaza Strip in a statement published on Saturday, describing it as a “glimpse of hope through the darkness” for Palestinians. It also stressed of ‘“immense” humanitarian needs that “must be addressed at scale, immediately” and called for the initial six-week ceasfire to extended into “a sustained agreement”.

• Two judges were killed in a shooting attack on Saturday outside the supreme court building in Tehran, Iranian state media reported. “Three judges of the supreme court were targeted. Two of them were martyred and one was injured,” the judiciary’s Mizan Online website reported, adding that the “assailant killed himself”.

Bethan McKernan

One of the sticking points between Israel and Hamas in ceasefire negotiations has been which Palestinians held in Israeli jails will be released – Israel has been loathe to include famous figures such as Fatah member Marwan Barghouti, who is extremely popular with the Palestinian public.

Among the well-known names on the list so far are is Khalida Jarrar, a well-known Palestinian parliamentarian with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) party, who is scheduled to be released on Sunday.

Jarrar has been arrested several times, including stints held in administrative detention, which allows for the preemptive arrest of subjects based on evidence which can be kept secret.

She served around three years in prison between 2019 and 2021 for membership of the PFLP, which Israel considers a terrorist organisation, and was arrested again and placed in administrative detention in December 2023, when Israel began sweeping arrest campaigns in the West Bank after the outbreak of the new war.

Also on the list is Zakaria Zubeidi of Jenin, a famous al-Aqsa Brigades commander from the second intifada, or Palestinian uprising, of the 2000s. He was one of six Palestinians who broke out of Gilboa prison in 2021, cementing his status as a folk hero. He has said in interviews that he was responsible for a 2002 attack in which six Israeli civilians were killed.

On Friday night, the Palestinian Authority announced it had reached an agreement to withdraw from Jenin’s refugee camp, where it has been fighting militant groups for the last seven weeks. The move is widely believed to be motivated by Zubeidi’s release: he is likely to be greeted by huge crowds of supporters on his return.