Regaining all of the approximate 136 hostages could still be months away despite the IDF’s notable progress in achieving operational control over northern Gaza, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
Whether Israel and the IDF can return all of the hostages is itself an open question given Hamas’s demands to date, and no signs so far that its leadership will agree either to a deal in which instead of being killed, they are merely arrested or expelled from Gaza in exchange.
But even if the more positive scenario plays out with some sort of new hostage deal, that deal is expected to only include some dozens of hostages, but not the full complement of hostages.
Rather, the full complement of hostages are only expected to be returned, even in the positive scenario, once the IDF zeroes in on the exact location of Hamas’s top three leaders: Yahya Sinwar, Muhammed Deif, and Marwan Issa, along with the hostages themselves.
At this stage, with the pace that the IDF is getting through the massive tunnel network in Khan Younis, where most or all of the Hamas leadership have said to be located, the Post understands that it could take months to find the exact locations.
All of this slow progress on the Hamas leadership and hostages issue comes even as the IDF on Saturday night said it now has full operational control of northern Gaza, with most of the fighting in that area having concluded already by December 19 with the fall of Jabalia.
The months dragging out on the hostages issue also occurs despite the fact that five reservist brigades have been released, half a dozen Israeli villages in the South have started to return to their residences, and the IDF probe of October 7 is rolling out – all signaling that the Gaza War is already in “Stage 3” of lower intensity conflict.
Given that the IDF is entering Stage 3, it then becomes unclear whether regaining the hostages is a few months away or closer, or whether it could drag out longer into some sort of siege and “staring contest” in which the IDF is afraid to attack for fear of killing the hostages, while the Hamas leadership refuse to surrender.
The IDF hopes and estimates that at some point in this range of time periods that the threat of an attack will convince Hamas’s leadership to release all of the hostages.
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