The four-day pause in fighting between Hamas and Israel in Gaza will begin at 7 am local time on Friday, with the first group of hostages set to be released later that day, a Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Thursday.

Driving the news: The announcement of the timeline for the Qatar-mediated deal came after a brief delay in the implementation of the agreement, which will see Hamas free at least 50 Israeli women and children in exchange for a multi-day pause in the fighting in Gaza and the release of 150 Palestinian women and children held in Israeli prisons.

• But Qatar received the lists of the first groups of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners who will be released, paving the way for the implementation of the deal to begin on Friday. The first group of hostages is expected to be released at 4 pm local time.
• Hamas’ military wing also confirmed the pause in fighting is set to begin on Friday at 7 am local time.
• The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office confirmed that Israel has received a list of hostages who will be released on Friday. “The list is being verified and the families are being notified,” the office said.

Details: The initial 50 hostages are expected to be released in four groups over the four-day pause in what has been described as the first phase of the deal, according to Israeli officials who briefed reporters.

• The Israeli officials also expressed cautious optimism that Hamas will agree to release additional hostages in exchange for Israel extending the pause in fighting. Under the agreement, Israel will extend the pause for every 10 additional hostages released.
• “We know Hamas are holding at least 70-80 women and children and that we can get all of them,” one of the officials said.

According to Israeli estimates, 40 children under the age of 19 and 13 mothers were abducted and brought to Gaza during the Oct. 7 terrorist attack.

• The Israeli officials said they believe other factions in Gaza are holding at least some of the children, but they are ready to give Hamas incentives to locate all of them.

There is more at the link!

I want to emphasize, again, that Sinwar/Hamas DO NOT know where all the hostages are, let alone the women and children. As such, Sinwar does not know if they’re alive or dead. And as we get into the second, third, and fourth day of this ceasefire this reality is going to become a major problem. Especially as Sinwar is getting far more from this temporary ceasefire than Bibi is. Sinwar has agreed to exchange at last 50 and up to 70 women and children hostages, which may not be possible because Hamas is not holding all of them. In exchange, Sinwar gets at least a four day stop in Israeli combat operations, three Palestinian prisoners – Palestinian women and children – currently incarcerated in Israel prisons on terrorism convictions for each Israeli hostage, fuel, and humanitarian supplies.

Just a note: the Palestinian prisoners are not really terrorists. These are largely women and children charged and convicted on nuisance charges, such as throwing rocks at IDF armored vehicles in east Jerusalem or the occupied West Bank or otherwise resisting the way that Israel’s security forces treat the Palestinians. For instance, under orders from/with the approval of convicted terrorist Ben Gvir, last week the Israelis demolished the house of a 13 year old Palestinian boy convicted as a terrorist for attacking an Israeli police officer. The actual details are that a child angry at being mistreated tried to stab an Israeli cop in east Jerusalem. He was disarmed, but another officer in the attempt to shoot and kill the boy missed and shot and killed the first cop. So the Israelis charged the 13 year old with terrorism and murder. I don’t know if he’ll be part of this prisoner exchange, but if he is, he has no home to go back to.

שימו לב לכך שקטאר בהודעתה מדגישה את כוונתה לכך שהפסקת האש הזאת תוביל לסיום המלחמה – וזה בדיוק היעד מספר אחת של חמאס https://t.co/rn7XdhyKZ8

— Elior Levy • אליאור לוי (@eliorlevy) November 23, 2023

Quote tweet:

Please note that Qatar in its statement emphasizes its intention that this ceasefire will lead to the end of the war – and this is exactly the number one goal of Hamas

Quoted tweet:

I have said this a lot in the last two weeks, but it is important to emphasize again: the prisoners who will be released as part of a deal with Israel (who are far from the definition of serious prisoners) are not of interest to Hamas.

What is critical for Hamas is this: a cease-fire as long as possible through which it will try to manipulate that will lead to an end to the war and to saving its leadership and rule in the Strip

There are a lot of moving pieces here and it appears the details are changing on the fly.

💥BBC cites "Israeli government source," saying Hamas has made "additional demands… though it’s not clear what those demands are." The @WSJ says Hamas is refusing to allow the Red Cross to visit hostages remaining in captivity. Qatar promises an imminent update. pic.twitter.com/C7eyTMXGkv

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

Hamas keeps changing its terms/requirements. The International Committee of the Red Cross is still saying it hasn’t been contacted to facilitate the exchanges. And Bibi decided to dial the rhetoric back up in his press conference last night.

💥Netanyahu's threats to kill Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh & Khaled Mashal are provoking puzzlement & concern in Israel, on the eve of a deal with these two men. As in, we know you wanna kill them. Why make a big announcement about it? https://t.co/Z0UprRiLF6

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 22, 2023

This was in response to Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Meshal apparently not understanding the gravity of the situation that the 7 October attack has created for them:

💥"Those who met Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh & Khaled Mashal came away with the sense they're euphoric. Haniyeh conveys to those present at meetings that Hamas will manage to maintain rule even the day after. It is obvious they've not grasped what happened in Gaza." @eliorlevy

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 22, 2023

Here’s the reporting by Elior Levy that Noga Tarnopolsky is referring too:

ציטוטים יוצאי דופן מהחדרים הסגורים של שניים בשמם המלא (לא גורמים בחמאס ולא בכירים בחמאס): איסמעיל הנייה וחאלד משעל.

אלו העדויות שהגיעו אליי על מה חושבת הנהגת חמאס על המלחמה ועל עתיד רצועת עזה, ומה הם משדרים לגורמים שישבו איתם באותם חדרים בשבועיים האחרונים. וזה לא פחות ממדהים: https://t.co/oa6HL6qkmY

— Elior Levy • אליאור לוי (@eliorlevy) November 22, 2023

Quote tweet:

Extraordinary quotes from the closed rooms of two by their full names (neither Hamas officials nor senior Hamas officials): Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Mashal.

These are the testimonies that have reached me about what the Hamas leadership thinks about the war and the future of the Gaza Strip, and what they are conveying to those who have sat in the same rooms with them for the past two weeks. And it is nothing less than amazing:

Quoted tweet:

“It’s clear that they didn’t get the message and they don’t really understand what’s happening in the Gaza Strip”: how does the Hamas leadership treat the war?

@eliorlevy with the exclusive testimonies of sources who recently met with Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Mashal
#חדשותהערב

While all of this is going on, Bibi and his extremist coalition partners are continuing to overturn Israel’s constitutional order by fiat using the state of emergency as cover for their actions. What they could not achieve legislatively in the spring, they are going to force into place under cover of the war.

בתגובה אומרים בסביבת לוין שנושא מינוי נשיא לעליון גם יידון בישיבה ב14 בדצמבר, ללא הצבעה על המינוי. הם מוסיפים שמדובר בטעות "סמנטית" וכי תחת הכותרת של דיון שופטי עליון הכוונה גם לדיון על נשיא עליון. נחכה ונראה

— aviad glickman (@aviadglickman) November 23, 2023

First tweet:

First publication: At the height of the fighting, Justice Minister Yariv Levin continues to delay the election of a permanent president of the Supreme Court: He set a hearing of the committee for the selection of judges on December 14, which is intended for a discussion on the election of supreme judges, but without a discussion on a supreme president. It is simply inconceivable that Levin still believes that the legal coup laws should be promoted

Second tweet:

In response, people around Levin say that the issue of appointing a president to the Supreme Court will also be discussed at the meeting on December 14, without a vote on the appointment. They add that this is a “semantic” mistake and that under the title of Supreme Courts’ discussion, it is also meant to be a discussion about a Supreme President. We will wait and see

💥Netanyahu continues his coup d'État after promising "the judicial reform is not on the table." (Please look shocked.) https://t.co/JESwS6HL3f

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

And it isn’t just the judiciary, he’s going full Putin, Orban, Erdogan, and Trump:

לאור הפצה באופן עקבי של "תעמולה תבוסתנית ושקרית, וחתירה נגד מדינת ישראל בשעת המלחמה" בעיתון הארץ, הגשתי כעת לממשלה, הצעת מחליטים להפסקת המימון של עיתון הארץ, כולל הפסקת הפרסום ודמי המנוי של כלל המשתמשים בשירות המדינה, כולל צה"ל, משטרה, שב"ס, משרדי ממשלה וכל חברה ממשלתית. pic.twitter.com/qdbH1K96kX

— 🇮🇱שלמה קרעי – Shlomo Karhi (@shlomo_karhi) November 23, 2023

In light of the consistent distribution of “defeatist and false propaganda, and incitement against the State of Israel during the war” in the Haaretz newspaper, I have now submitted to the government, a resolution proposal to stop the funding of the Haaretz newspaper, including the cessation of publication and the subscription fees of all users of the state service, including the IDF, police, SHBS, government offices and any government company.

 

💥Netanyahu's coup d'État does not stop for wars https://t.co/kV16lF7IUu

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

ההסברה הישראלית לעולם: "יש פה מאבק בין ארגון טרור רצחני לבין הדמוקרטיה היחידה במזרח התיכון"

שר התקשורת הישראלי לעולם: "תראו איך אני מנסה לחסל את העיתון הישראלי שהכי מוכר בחו"ל, כדי לקושש לייקים מהבייס"

בחייאת, שרי ממשלת ישראל. מילא שאתם לא עוזרים בכלום, אבל לפחות אל תפריעו https://t.co/u2wTWuNBaH

— Yair Tarchitsky (@yairtar) November 23, 2023

Israeli propaganda to the world: “There is a struggle here between a murderous terrorist organization and the only democracy in the Middle East”

The Israeli Minister of Communications to the world: “Look how I am trying to eliminate the Israeli newspaper that is best known abroad, in order to gain likes from the base”

Haiyat, ministers of the Israeli government. It’s true that you’re not helping anything, but at least don’t get in the way

Never go full Putin, Orban, Erdogan, and Trump!

The notifications of who is being released are going well:

💥THEY ARE HEARING ABOUT THIS LIKE YOU. Netanyahu's hostage point man says liaison officers will call families about whose hostages release "we have initial or complete information. There will also be outreach to families of children not on list &finally to those of all hostages"

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

💥All families of Israeli hostages to be released have received their calls. https://t.co/FIXiqYwqs4

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

💥The families of Israeli hostages are being tortured https://t.co/LZsBaZaORE

— Noga Tarnopolsky נגה טרנופולסקי نوغا ترنوبولسكي (@NTarnopolsky) November 23, 2023

This is already a shit show. And it is going to get worse. Especially when families find out Sinwar can’t locate their family members or that they have died while being held by the PIJ or the Gazan criminal gangs that took them!

Finally, Princess asked this question in the comments to my Ukraine war update last night:

On Israel — so we have been told that the Hamas assault was intended to grab hostages that could be used in a big prisoner swap. Makes sense from events. But after six weeks Sinwar still doesn’t know where they are? Knows so little he can’t even cobble together fifty women and children to hand over out of 200+? Something isn’t holding together. Is it a sign of conflict among the jihadists? Is he lying? Are most of them already dead?

The answer is that Sinwar’s Hamas fighters were not the only hostage takers. Nor does he actually care about them. What he wants is to keep the consensus of the war – its causes, how it is being prosecuted by both sides – firmly focused on Israel. He wants people who know better – like Martin Griffiths – to make stupid statements like this:

When Griffiths says it’s “the worst ever”, he disregards 25,000 children who died in Syria, children who are approx. 70% of the 377,000 casualties in Yemen, 8,000 children who died In Afghanistan, and higher numbers in the war that is happening right now in Ethiopia.
I wonder why https://t.co/50Z7BrISsm

— Efrat Lachter (@EfratLachter) November 23, 2023

What does an antisemite look like?

It looks like Martin Griffiths @UNReliefChief saying on CNN the situation in Gaza is “the worst he’s ever seen.” Not over 1.5 million people murdered in Cambodia when he was there, not the half a million in Rwanda or the half a million in Syria https://t.co/MkaNwC3vMB

— יאיר לפיד – Yair Lapid (@yairlapid) November 23, 2023

Sinwar wants the discussion to be that the IDF found no evidence that Hamas was using al Shifa Hospital as cover for its operations, despite facts indicating otherwise:

Visual analysis shows exact path of Hamas tunnels under Al-Shifa hospital: 160 meters – with rooms, bathrooms, kitchenette, comms, electricity and air conditioning – run under the internal medicine ward and emergency generator building
with @YardenMichaelihttps://t.co/kpAay87Kwo

— avi scharf (@avischarf) November 23, 2023

and here's Haaretz's own @yanivkub reporting from inside

Did Hamas operate under Al-Shifa? A tour of the tunnels leaves no room for doubt https://t.co/GjUjHjPmg0

— avi scharf (@avischarf) November 23, 2023

When you consider the sourcing, remember that Israel’s government, as indicated above, is now going after Haaretz for not being suitably sycophantic and jingoistic in its reporting.

Finally, he also wants to be able to protect his assets. Via the Internet archive, here’s The Economist‘s accounting of Hamas’s war chest, which you’ll notice they’re not using to improve the lives of anyone in Gaza:

Viewed from one of Istanbul’s glitziest restaurants, the Bosphorus looks sublime. The venue is a favoured haunt of mandarins, businessmen, minor celebrities—and Hamas’s financiers. A man on whom America has imposed sanctions for funding the Islamist group describes his various board seats. “It’s ridiculous,” he says, of America’s accusation, but eventually admits, “now, if you’re asking what our employees do with their own money, why would I know?”

Hamas has three sources of power: its physical force inside Gaza, the reach of its ideas and its income. Since Hamas’s attacks on October 7th, Israel has killed more than 12,000 Palestinians in Gaza in seeking to wreck the first. But Israel’s declared goal of destroying Hamas for good requires its financial base to be dismantled, too. Very little of this sits in Gaza at all. Instead, it is overseas in friendly countries. Furnished with money-launderers, mining companies and much else, Hamas’s financial empire is reckoned to bring in more than $1bn a year. Having been painstakingly crafted to avoid Western sanctions, it may be out of reach for Israel and its allies.

Hamas’s income pays for everything from schoolteachers’ salaries to missiles. Around $360m each year comes from import taxes on goods brought into Gaza from the West Bank or Egypt. This is the easiest source of cash for Israel to strangle. After withdrawing from the strip in 2005, it strictly limited the movement of goods and people across the border. Now it stops even most basic necessities from getting in.

A much larger income stream, though, comes from abroad. Israeli officials reckon this amounts to around $750m per year, making it the main source of funding for Hamas’s current stockpile of arms and fuel. Some comes from friendly governments, the biggest of which is Iran. America reckons that the ayatollahs provide $100m to Palestinian Islamist groups, mainly in military aid. The task for Hamas’s financiers is to move this money around without falling prey to America’s sanctions. In the past month alone, American officials have imposed three rounds of restrictions on people and companies for funding Hamas.

Dodging American sanctions requires some ingenuity. Millions of dollars flow to Hamas through crypto markets. “You’d be surprised how much of the market’s activity comes back to [Hamas],” says Firuze Segzin, an economist at Bilkent University. America’s treasury department says Hamas has smuggled more than $20m through Redin, a currency exchange crammed among tourist shops deep in Istanbul’s run-down Fatih neighbourhood.

But the lion’s share of Hamas’s money—at least $500m a year, say Israeli officials—comes from its investments, some of which are firms registered in countries across the Middle East. These are run by professionals from Hamas’s investment office and employ its members. American officials say the firms donate to charities which in turn funnel funds to Hamas; Turkish officials say profits are sometimes taken directly. Untangling these revenue streams is tricky for Western regulators. One such firm built the Afra Mall, Sudan’s first shopping mall, while another mines near Khartoum, its capital. A third built skyscrapers in Sharjah, in the United Arab Emirates (uae). Many of these companies boast of their business deals, but deny affiliation with Hamas.

Can any revenue streams remaining to Hamas be choked off? That depends on the countries through which they flow. Since 1989, when Israel arrested a handful of Hamas’s top brass in Gaza and the West Bank, its bankers have lived abroad. Over time, though, geopolitical shifts have forced them to keep moving. Hamas abandoned its first financial hub, Amman, after Jordan’s ties to America grew too close.

Today, while Hamas’s politicians favour Doha, the capital of Qatar, and its companies range from Algeria and Sudan to the uae, its financiers live in Istanbul. Zaher Jabarin, accused by Israel of running Hamas’s finances (which he denies), is based there, as are several other individuals under sanctions by America for funding the organisation. Eager to gain regional influence by supporting the Palestinian cause, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s president, offers shelter. Israel says that the Turkish government hands out passports (which it denies) and lets Hamas keep an office in the country.

Meanwhile, Turkey’s banking system helps Hamas dodge American sanctions by conducting complex transactions across the world. A booming, lightly regulated crypto market helps. Many of Turkey’s biggest banks, including Kuveyt Turk, have been accused by Israel and America of knowingly storing Hamas’s cash. Some murmur that Mr Erdogan quietly approves. In 2021 the Financial Action Task Force, a g7 watchdog, placed Turkey on its “grey list” of countries doing too little to freeze terrorists’ assets.

No one benefits more than Hamas’s businessmen. The Turkish government’s tacit approval “opens doors and makes things smooth in business”, says one of the group’s finance employees. Trend gyo, an Istanbul-listed firm that has been placed under sanctions by America for funnelling funds to Hamas, won an official contract to build Istanbul Commerce University. Construction companies, which feature heavily in Hamas’s portfolio, can quietly swallow huge lumps of cash, and regularly receive large loans. All this allows Turkish officials to say that they are not directly lining Hamas’s pockets.

So far, Hamas seems financially bulletproof. Israel has inflicted little harm on either its income or savings; Turkey’s banks have been unco-operative. America’s numerous sanctions are less effective if their targets can keep cash outside its banking system. And Hamas hides its companies well. “Every time you think you’ve got a big fish, it changes its name,” despairs one ex-Treasury official.

In fact, the risk is that Hamas’s finances will improve. As Israel steps up its attacks on Gaza, Western governments may blanch at the humanitarian horror. Countries with pro-Palestinian populations may make it even easier for Hamas to earn money. For months, rumours have circulated that some civil servants in Mr Erdogan’s economic ministry are co-ordinating with Hamas’s finance office.

For Israel, Hamas growing richer despite the war would be a disaster. With its wealth and financial roots intact, it—or a similar organisation—may well flourish after the destruction. Gazans, meanwhile, have been plunged into tragedy so that Israel can destroy a group whose money and power are safely ensconced elsewhere. Compare their plight to the picture in Istanbul: eating lobster and gazing at the Bosphorus.

That’s enough for today.

Open thread!