Hamas Armed Wing Offers to Exchange 70 Israel Hostages for 5-Day Cease-Fire

• Hamas’ armed wing offers to free 70 Israeli hostages in exchange for a five-day truce.
• Qatari mediators facilitated talks for the release of four hostages previously and the recent discussions for 70 hostages.
• A total of approximately 240 hostages are being held following Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel.

The armed wing of Hamas announced on Monday that it was prepared to liberate 70 Israeli hostages, predominantly women and children, in return for a five-day ceasefire in Gaza.

Abu Ubaida, the al-Qassam Brigades’ spokesperson, mentioned in an audio recording shared on Telegram and reported by Reuters that talks with Qatari mediators had taken place.

“Last week there was an effort from the Qatari brothers to release the enemy captives from women and children, in return for the release of 200 Palestinian children and 75 women detained by the enemy,” mentioned Ubaida, according to Reuters.

The proposed truce, as per Ubaida, “should include a complete cease-fire and allow aid and humanitarian relief everywhere in the Gaza Strip,” Reuters reported.

Roughly 240 hostages were taken prisoner during Hamas’ terrorist attack in Israel on October 7, which killed approximately 1,400 people.

A representative for the militant group in Qatar hasn’t responded to Insider’s request for comment.

Although Hamas released four hostages last month through Qatari mediation, and four more were freed by the Israel Defense Forces, no additional hostages have been released since Monday’s announcement.

The IDF also didn’t respond to Insider’s request for comment.

Ubaida also accused Israel of “procrastinating and evading” a deal in the audio recording, Reuters reported. Previous reports indicated that Hamas proposed exchanging 50 Israeli hostages for a five-day cease-fire in Gaza — an offer that Israel rejected.

The Guardian, which cited three sources familiar with those talks, said the deal involved the freeing of children, women, the elderly, and sick people in exchange for a pause in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, which Hamas said would enable it to gather the hostages.

However, Israel demanded a much shorter timeframe for collecting the hostages, a task deemed to be insurmountable by Hamas.

The latest cease-fire negotiation efforts come amidst a rising death toll in Gaza. The Strip’s health ministry says the total death count now exceeds 11,000 people.