Trump says 10 Israeli hostages to be released from Gaza ‘very shortly’

Ten more hostages will be released from Gaza “very shortly”, Donald Trump said at the White House Friday. The news comes as the president continues to push for a 60-day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

“We got most of the hostages back. We’re going to have another 10 coming very shortly, and we hope to have that finished quickly,” Trump said during a dinner with Republican senators. He also praised his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff as “fantastic”.

The current Israel-Hamas ceasefire proposal includes terms calling for the return of 10 hostages, and the remains of 18 others. In exchange, Israel would be required to release an unspecified number of Palestinians held in Israeli jails.

Earlier on Friday, Axios reported that the director of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, visited Washington this week in hope that the United States would support its efforts to ask other countries to take in the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians still living in Gaza. Mossad chief David Barnea told Witkoff that Israel has discussed relocating Palestinians to Ethiopia, Indonesia and Libya.

Trump has boasted that a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas would be fothcoming since posting on his social media platform on 1 July that Israel has agreed to the “necessary conditions” to finalise a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza.

Last week, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the White House, where he presented Trump with a copy of a letter he had sent to the Nobel committee nominating the president for a Nobel peace prize.

That same week, Qatari officials mediated indirect talks between Israel and Hamas over a ceasefire.

A spokesperson for the armed wing of Hamas told Reuters on Friday that the group favors reaching an interim truce in the Gaza war, but could revert to insisting on a full package deal if such an agreement is not reached in current negotiations.