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00:00 Joining me now from Beirut is Olivier Lebroit-Devin, a senior reporter at L'Orient Le Jour.
00:07 Olivier, thank you for your time.
00:08 Israel, as you and I know, has a complicated history of negotiating hostage releases and
00:13 the most impactful being the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit back in 2011 after five
00:21 years in captivity.
00:23 So this situation with a mixture of both civilians and soldiers as hostages is unprecedented,
00:31 isn't it?
00:32 Yeah, that is correct.
00:34 We look back in recent history, there has not been a situation where Israel has been
00:40 faced with such a significant number of hostages.
00:42 We're looking at about 230 civilians and also some Israeli soldiers.
00:48 If you look back, the most recent and important precedent was what you just said there, what
00:53 happened to Gilad Shalit in 2006.
00:56 He was a 19-year-old IDF soldier who was kidnapped and held for five years by Hamas.
01:03 Now, what happened there was important.
01:05 We saw after five years of captivity that he was released and returned alive, marking
01:12 the first Israeli soldier to be returned alive since 1985.
01:16 And he really became a symbol for the Israeli people in terms of the sense of bringing home
01:25 any soldier and any civilian at any price.
01:28 And that sentiment is really important until this day.
01:35 And importantly with that situation, what we saw in 2006 was the largest prisoner exchange
01:41 in Israel's history, with over 1,000 Palestinian prisoners being freed.
01:46 It's essentially a high price for a single soldier.
01:50 And importantly, again, just to add into the context why this is all playing into the mindsets
01:56 of the Israeli government and also the Israeli population, is because among one of those
02:00 people who were released on the Palestinian side was now Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar.
02:08 So again, this goes back to the complication.
02:10 It's sort of straightforward negotiation.
02:12 There are far more many people involved.
02:15 And of course, the stakes are a lot higher than they were in 2006.
02:19 And of course, it's very difficult for people outside of Israel to understand the mood of
02:23 Israeli society and how much that drives both the military and political leadership in dealing
02:31 with this hostage situation.
02:32 Yeah, correct.
02:34 Of course, public opinion is critical.
02:36 And what we've really seen in recent weeks is sustained pressure on Netanyahu from both
02:43 the families of hostages, but also the wider public.
02:48 And we've seen criticisms, like people saying that the hostages have become a pawn of war.
02:54 Some families have accused Netanyahu and his government of prioritizing the destruction
02:59 of Hamas over the release of hostages.
03:02 And we've seen for weeks the pressure continue.
03:06 Last night, for example, I saw footage coming from Tel Aviv of families of children, some
03:11 of the 20 children being held hostage by Hamas, holding a rally outside the United Nations
03:17 calling for their immediate release.
03:20 And of course, this is something that has played into Netanyahu's thinking, seemingly,
03:24 because for the last 10 days, Netanyahu had been adamant that it was the military campaign
03:30 which was going to secure the release of Israeli hostages.
03:34 But now it seems the dial has shifted somewhat, both inside the wall cabinet and more broadly.
03:43 Now, coming back to where you're located in Beirut, Olivia, I mean, how will the outcome
03:49 of these negotiations impact those tensions?
03:52 I mean, more than tensions, I mean, we've seen actual conflict between Hezbollah and
03:57 Israel on its northern border.
04:00 Yeah, and it's important to say that those tensions are continuing to the scale of being
04:05 continued ongoing strikes between Hezbollah, the militant group here, and the Israeli army.
04:12 Importantly, in Hassan Nafrallah, the leader of Hezbollah's most recent speech, he made
04:16 it clear he called for a ceasefire and reiterated the point that for him and his Iranian backer
04:23 and the kind of axis of resistant allies, the most important thing for them is for casualties
04:29 to be kept to a minimum, for a ceasefire to happen immediately.
04:34 But also he has made various failed threats against Israel that if there's a significant
04:40 campaign to destroy Hamas and further casualties, that, you know, they could be, the Israeli
04:47 side should be expecting the real threat of a wider regional escalation.
04:51 So ultimately, I think what we can predict here is that the release of hostages in exchange
04:58 for Palestinian prisoners would be welcomed.
05:00 But it's just really important to say this is still only but one part of what is a wider
05:07 existential issue in the region when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
05:12 So I imagine still we have to watch for caution and the issues between southern Lebanon and
05:17 northern Israel won't probably change significantly following this deal, especially given that
05:23 it is by the looks of it from what we're hearing, it's going to be a short term deal, potentially
05:28 just five days.
05:30 So again, the situation here is still tense.
05:33 There's still ongoing strikes.
05:35 And so it will help not to have a greater escalation for five days.
05:40 We don't know what's going to happen after that.
05:42 And questions still remain whether Israel may be emboldened by the deal and may seek
05:46 to expand their campaign into southern Gaza and potentially target senior Hamas commanders.
05:52 And that again could shift the dial and the calculus for Hezbollah and its allies.
05:58 Olivia LePort de Verne, thank you so much again.
06:02 [BLANK_AUDIO]