Israel-Hamas war live: end of ceasefire nears, 30 Palestinian prisoners released

It’s now 1.5 hours to the end of a truce between Hamas and Israel.

International mediators are racing to strike a deal to allow further exchanges and prolong the halt of Israel’s air and ground offensive. Associated Press reports that the talks appear to be growing tougher as most of the women and children held by Hamas are freed, and the militants are expected to seek greater releases in return for freeing men and soldiers.

International pressure has mounted for the ceasefire to continue as long as possible after nearly eight weeks of Israeli bombardment and a ground campaign in Gaza that has killed thousands of Palestinians and led to a humanitarian crisis.

Israel has welcomed the release of dozens of hostages in recent days and says it will maintain the truce if Hamas keeps freeing captives.

Still, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu underscored on Wednesday that Israel will resume its campaign to eliminate Hamas.

After this phase of returning our abductees is exhausted, will Israel return to fighting? So my answer is an unequivocal yes

There is no way we are not going back to fighting until the end.

He was speaking ahead of a visit to the region by US secretary of state Antony Blinken.

Here’s some analysis from Dan Sabbagh in Jerusalem about what to expect in the next phase if the truce between Israel and Hamas is not extended. That truce is set to end at 7am local time.

While talks continued over extending the truce in Gaza, the Israeli Defense Forces have continued to prepare for a resumption of hostilities within days – which risks provoking an unprecedented humanitarian crisis among an already desperate population.

Read more by Dan Sabbagh here.

Hamas’ armed wing has told its fighters in the Gaza Strip to be ready to resume battles with Israel if a temporary truce set to expire in under two hours is not renewed, Reuters reported.

The extended truce between Israel and Hamas is set to end at 7am Thursday local time (5am GMT).

“The Al-Qassam Brigades asks its active forces to maintain high combat readiness in the last hours of the truce,” the militant group said in a statement.

Fighters should “remain on such footing unless an official statement is issued confirming the extension of the truce,” the statement added.

Prominent Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi was among 30 prisoners freed by Israel early on Thursday under a temporary Gaza truce between Israel and Hamas militants, according to Israeli and Palestinian officials.

Israeli troops earlier this month arrested Tamimi, regarded in the occupied West Bank as a hero since she was a teenager, on suspicion of inciting violence. Her mother has denied the allegation and said it was based on a fake social media post, Reuters reports.

The Israel Prison Service posted a list of Palestinians released on Thursday morning to its website that included Tamimi.

A Palestinian official said she was released after being jailed in Damon Prison, near the Israeli city of Haifa.

Under a truce set to expire shortly, Israel has released Palestinians from its jails in exchange for Hamas’ release of some of the 240 hostages it captured during its deadly 7 October rampage in southern Israel.

For more on Ahed Tamimi, see this earlier piece by Bethan McKernan and Sufian Taha in Jerusalem

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war. My name is Reged Ahmad and I’ll be with you for the next while.

The extended truce between Israel and Hamas is due set to end in the coming hours – at 7am Thursday local time (5am GMT). It’s currently 4:42am in Israel.

Israel has released another group of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for 16 hostages freed hours earlier by Hamas in Gaza. The latest swap for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel under the Gaza truce comes as international mediators raced to seal another extension to allow further exchanges and prolong the halt of Israel’s air and ground offensive.

More on this shortly. In the meantime, here are the other key recent developments:

• 30 Palestinian prisoners have been released by Israel. A bus carrying some of the Palestinian detainees was seen arriving in the West Bank city of Ramallah before dawn.

• Most prominent among those freed was Ahed Tamimi, a 22-year-old activist who gained worldwide fame in 2017 after a video of her slapping an Israeli soldier went viral on social media.

• China says the UN security council should intensify its diplomatic mediation, relaunch the two-state solution and convene a “more authoritative and effective” international peace conference at the soonest, in a position paper on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict released on Thursday.

• Sixteen hostages were released today, including 12 Israelis and four Thais. Among the Israeli hostages released today were Elena Trupanov and Irena Tati, two dual Israeli-Russian citizens who were released earlier this evening.

• The Palestinians to be released from Israeli prisons in exchange include 16 minors and 14 women, the Qatari foreign ministry said.

• A Hamas source said on Wednesday that the group was not satisfied with Israel’s proposals for another truce extension, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports. Speaking to AFP ahead of the expiration of the current truce, which will be at 7am local time on Thursday, the source said: “What is being proposed in the discussions to extend the truce is not the best.”

• The Palestine Red Cross Society (PRCS) delivered 21 trucks of aid into Gaza and northern areas on Wednesday. “PRCS is committed to delivering the largest number possible of humanitarian aid to north Gaza, which had not received any aid prior to the humanitarian pause agreement,” the group said.

• Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, has said Israeli forces are ready to resume fighting “immediately”. Posting to social media on Wednesday, Gallant wrote: “We are making every attempt to return all the abductees and to fully exploit the current move to return all the abducted women and children in Gaza. IDF forces in the air, on land and at sea are ready to resume fighting immediately.”

• Two boys, one eight years old and the other 15, were shot and killed by Israeli forces on Wednesday in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, the Palestinian health ministry said. In a statement reported by Agence France-Presse, the health ministry said: “Adam al-Ghul, eight years old, and Bassem Abu el-Wafa, 15 years old, were killed by bullets from the occupier [Israel].”

• Benjamin Nentanyahu has spoken with representatives of the Bibas family after reports from Hamas that three of its members were killed, including 10-month-old Kfir Bibas, Haaretz reports. According to Haaretz, the Israeli prime minister told the family representatives that the matter was being investigated by Israel’s security forces.

• The US is hopeful that the truce in Gaza between Israel and Hamas can be extended, the US ambassador to the UN, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told reporters on Wednesday, Reuters reports. “We’re hopeful the truce can be extended,” Thomas-Greenfield said, adding: “This is all in the hands of Hamas. The Israelis have said if they continue to release 10 hostages a day, they will extend by a day. So it truly is in their hands. But I do think there is a potential for that and we are actively working to extend the deal.”

• Three Qatari armed forces aircraft carrying 108 tons of aid for Palestinians in Gaza have arrived in El Erish, Egypt, Qatar’s news agency announced on Wednesday. The three planes, which carried basic food supplies and shelter equipment, brings the total number of Qatari planes sent to Gaza to 30, carrying 1,018 tons of aid.

• Speaking at the UN security council on Wednesday, Palestine’s foreign minister, Riad al-Maliki, said that the ongoing violence between Israel and Hamas was “not a war” but rather a “carnage that no one can justify”. “It must be brought to an end,” al-Maliki said.

• Jordan will host an international conference on Thursday that will be attended by the main UN bodies, as well as regional and international relief agencies to coordinate humanitarian aid to Gaza, Reuters reports. The UN aid head, Martin Griffiths, as well as key UN bodies and NGOs involved in increasing the entry of aid into Gaza, are expected to attend the conference, along with representatives from western and Arab countries.

• The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said on Wednesday that Gaza is in the midst of an “epic humanitarian catastrophe”. Addressing a UN security council meeting chaired by China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, Guterres said “we must not look away” from the deteriorating humanitarian crisis that has engulfed Gaza.