DEAL FINALIZED.

 DEAL FINALIZED.

Jeremiah 6:14
14 They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

Isaiah 57:21
21 There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.

1 Thessalonians 5:3
3 For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.

Ephesians 2:2
2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:

Israel and Hamas sign hostage-ceasefire deal in Doha after mediators iron out final kinks-By Jacob Magid-Today, 3:00 am-JAN 16,25

Israeli and Hamas negotiating teams have signed a hostage release and ceasefire deal in Doha, an Arab official from one of the mediating countries confirms to The Times of Israel.The deal was announced Wednesday, but the negotiating teams continued meeting afterward in order to finalize implementation details, the official says.A particular point of dispute was over the identities of the Palestinian security prisoners slated for release, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office issuing a statement early on Thursday accusing Hamas of reneging on its commitments.The issue was ultimately resolved by the mediators, allowing the Israeli and Hamas teams to move forward with signing the agreement.While Israel’s decision-making security cabinet and full cabinet had been originally been slated to vote on the deal on Thursday, Netanyahu insisted on waiting until the agreement was signed before holding a vote.The security cabinet meeting has now been rescheduled for Friday. A subsequent vote before the full cabinet is also required, but an Israeli official tells The Times of Israel that it will only take place on Saturday, in what will likely delay the start of the deal until Monday, instead of the originally planned Sunday.After the full cabinet vote, a list of Palestinian security prisoners to be freed will be published, and opponents will have 48 hours to petition against these releases to the Supreme Court.The Israeli official did not provide an explanation for why the full cabinet vote couldn’t take place on Friday as well. However, Channel 12 explained that it was decided by the Prime Minister’s Office that if the original timetable were to be maintained, and a vote to be taken tomorrow, this would mean opponents of the prisoner releases would have almost no time to lodge appeals because of Shabbat. The court is not expected to intervene in the releases.Channel 12 said judicial sources have made clear that the formal 48-hour period for petitions can be shortened, as happened ahead of the November 2023 truce, and that the intended Sunday start of the deal need not be affected, but that the Prime Minister’s Office was not persuaded.The deal is currently scheduled to take effect on Sunday at 12:15 p.m., with the first three hostages to be released soon after. If the Prime Minister’s Office sticks to its reported new, delayed timetable, the first hostage releases would go ahead on Monday — the day of US President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.While far-right ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir are expected to vote against the deal, it is still expected to have enough support to pass both the security cabinet and full cabinet votes.Netanyahu is still working to convince Smotrich to back the deal. The prime minister’s Likud party issued a statement Thursday claiming the US has given Israel guarantees that will allow it to resume fighting after the first stage of the deal, as Smotrich has demanded, in what would be an apparent violation of the deal’s terms.

US president: There’s a genuine opportunity for a new future-Biden: US-backed pressure on Iranian axis helped secure hostage deal, end of Gaza war-Outgoing US officials acknowledge that cooperation from Trump’s team provided boost, argue that Israel’s ‘defanging’ of Hezbollah isolated Hamas enough for it to accept ceasefire By Jacob Magid-Today, 6:43 am-JAN 16,25

US President Joe Biden hailed the hostage release and ceasefire agreement that his administration helped ink on Wednesday, asserting that the deal will bring about a “permanent end of the war” in Gaza after the second of the proposal’s three phases.“It’s a very good afternoon,” Biden began in his White House address announcing the agreement, which he had been working to deliver for the past seven months since unveiling the terms of the proposal on May 31.That earlier speech was seen as a savvy political move by Biden, who called on Hamas to accept the three-phase framework, which the president revealed had actually been approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu four days earlier. By exposing the details publicly along with Netanyahu’s private agreement to them, Washington hoped that half of the work was behind it.But the months that followed saw significant Hamas intransigence, along with Netanyahu walking back from the terms of his May 27 proposal.Hamas, through the summer, felt emboldened enough by the support it was receiving from Iran and the Islamic Republic’s chief proxy Hezbollah to continue fighting, with its leader at the time Yahya Sinwar uninterested in a ceasefire, said a senior Biden administration official briefing reporters after the Wednesday announcement.Netanyahu meanwhile added conditions to his May 27 proposal regarding the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, which led to the torpedoing of negotiations in July, US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller acknowledged in a separate Wednesday briefing.While Qatari and Egyptian mediators along with members of Israel’s hostage negotiation team privately blamed both sides for the lack of a deal to date, the Biden administration has publicly maintained that Hamas was the main obstacle, particularly since August.The senior US official told reporters that it was then that the US shifted its approach to the Gaza war, prioritizing the support of Israel “defanging” Hezbollah, based on the belief that doing so would further isolate Hamas and lead the terror group to show more flexibility in the ceasefire talks.The Biden aide also acknowledged that the outgoing administration’s collaboration with US President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team — particularly incoming Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff — played a crucial role in bringing the deal across the finish line.Senior Arab diplomats familiar with the negotiations went further, saying it was the pressure that Witkoff put on Netanyahu during a Saturday meeting in Jerusalem that helped secure a breakthrough in the negotiations.Trump has repeatedly threatened “all hell to pay” if the hostages are not released by January 20, and while the message was directed at Hamas, Trump’s desire to end the war required Israel to fall in line as well.Biden in his White House speech argued that US-backed pressure on Hamas and weakening of the Iran-backed Axis of Resistance against Israel led the terror group to eventually agree to the deal that had been on the table since May.“We’ve reached this point because of the pressure that Israel built on Hamas, backed by the United States,” he said. Biden highlighted Israel’s October killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar along with many of the terror group’s senior commanders and thousands of its fighters, in addition to the destruction of its military formations.He recalled how the US twice over the past year helped Israel thwart missile attacks from “Hamas’ strongest supporter, Iran.” He did not mention the billions of dollars in security assistance along with critical diplomatic cover that the US provided Israel as the international community — and many Democratic voters — turned on Jerusalem due to the Gaza humanitarian crisis sparked by the war.But Biden did boast of having “shaped Israel’s strong and calibrated response, [which] destroyed Iran’s air defenses but avoided… an all-out war.” The president at the time publicly cautioned Israel against hitting Iranian nuclear or oil sites.He also highlighted the coalition that the US recruited to defend the Red Sea against Houthi attacks — a mission that has not succeed in stopping the Iran-backed Yemeni rebel group’s continued missile attacks against Israel and on shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. The Houthis pledged to continue attacks until a ceasefire is reached in Gaza.“The United States helped to shape and change the equation, and the terror network that once protected and sustained Hamas is far weaker. Iran is weaker than has been in decades,” Biden said.467 days of failure, 1 day of success-In answer to a question, the president noted: “This is the exact framework of the deal I proposed back in May. Exact. And, we got the world to endorse it.”The first phase will commence on Sunday and see the release of 33 of the 98 hostages in exchange for roughly 1,000 Palestinian security prisoners and a partial Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. The second phase will see the release of the remaining living hostages and will conclude with a permanent end to the war and full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. The third phase will see Hamas release the remaining bodies of hostages in its possession.During the first phase, Israel and Hamas will resume negotiations aimed at agreeing to terms for phase two, “which is a permanent end of the war — let me say it again, a permanent end of the war,” Biden asserted in his speech.If those talks extend longer than the first phase’s 42 days, the ceasefire will remain in place, as long as the parties remain at the negotiating table.Biden said he’s spoken to the leaders of Qatar and Egypt and all three have pledged that the negotiations will keep moving forward “for as long as it takes.”Netanyahu had long insisted that he would not agree to permanently end the war until Hamas’s governing and military capabilities have been dismantled, and sought — apparently unsuccessfully — during negotiations to ensure that Israel could resume fighting after the first stage.While Netanyahu is facing immense pressure from his far-right coalition partners to resume fighting after the first phase, Biden said he was “confident” that Israel and Hamas will reach phase two of the agreement.The hostage negotiation that climaxed Wednesday was one of the most difficult of his career, Biden said.“I’m deeply satisfied this day has come for the sake of the people of Israel and the [hostages’] families of waiting in agony, for the sake of the innocent people in Gaza who suffered unimaginable devastation because of the war,” Biden said. “The Palestinian people have gone through hell. Too many innocent people have died. Too many communities have been destroyed.”“This has been a time of real turmoil in the Middle East, but as I prepare to leave office, our friends are strong, our enemies are weak, and there’s a genuine opportunity for a new future,” Biden said.He also suggested that the hostage deal could lead to the creation of a “credible pathway” to a Palestinian state. This would require Israeli acquiescence, which Jerusalem has repeatedly made clear it will not grant.He then cited former US senator and Northern Ireland peace negotiator George Mitchell’s quote that “diplomacy is 700 days of failure and one day of success,” which he paraphrased.“We’ve had many difficult days since the Hamas began this terrible war. We’ve encountered roadblocks and setbacks. But we haven’t given up. And now, after more than 400 days of struggle, a day of success has arrived,” Biden concluded.The Trump factor-Before departing, Biden was asked whether he or Trump should get credit for the deal.“Is that a joke?” he responded, apparently insulted by the question.But to many onlookers, the shouted query seemed legitimate.“This EPIC ceasefire agreement could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November, as it signaled to the entire World that my Administration would seek Peace and negotiate deals to ensure the safety of all Americans, and our Allies,” Trump wrote in a celebratory post on Truth Social.Biden acknowledged in his speech that while the deal was negotiated by his administration, it will be implemented by the incoming Trump administration.“In these past few days, we’ve been speaking as one team,” he said, stressing that he had instructed his aides after the election to coordinate with Trump’s team.Miller was a bit more effusive, subsequently telling reporters that the involvement of Trump’s team had “been absolutely critical in getting this deal over the line.Miller said that the cooperation between outgoing White House Mideast czar Brett McGurk and incoming Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff, who sat together at the negotiation table over the past week may well have been unprecedented and demonstrated the power of bipartisanship.The senior US official said they periodically split up, with McGurk staying back in Doha on Saturday to lead the negotiations, while Witkoff flew to Israel to meet with Netanyahu.Netanyahu held separate calls with Biden and Trump on Wednesday night to express his gratitude for their efforts.According to a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office, Netanyahu thanked Trump for his “help in advancing the release of the hostages and helping Israel to bring an end to the suffering of dozens of hostages and their families.”Netanyahu also thanked the incoming US president for his comments earlier today that Gaza will “NEVER again become a terrorist safe haven.” The pair agreed to meet soon in Washington, Netanyahu’s office said. The Israeli readout on Netanyahu’s call with Biden was shorter and less detailed.The senior US official briefing reporters said the Netanyahu-Biden call was warm and that the two leaders reflected on the horrors of October 7 and the plight of the hostages and the joy of being able to reunite them with their families. Netanyahu also noted that he and Biden had experienced a significant number of historical moments throughout their 44 years knowing each other, the senior US official said.