Israel-Hamas ceasefire

There are 4 replies in this Thread which has previously been viewed 740 times. The latest Post (February 24, 2025 at 1:19 PM) was by Rice.

    After working hard on this for 15 months, President Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken finally got both sides to agree. Although I wish their efforts had succeeded much earlier, I’m so glad they got this ceasefire in place before time ran out. On Monday, they will both return to being normal citizens with no authority to negotiate with other countries.

    Now we are all hoping that most of the remaining hostages are still living and in salvageable mental and physical condition. What a horrendous, prolonged nightmare!

    I was wandering why Israel is handing over more Palestinian prisoners than it's getting hostages in exchange. In some cases it's 100 Palestinians to 3 Israeli hostages.

    Hamas is alleged to have declared "We love death much more than we love life."

    Others have said that an Israeli life is worth more than a Palestinian life which is the most cynical comment I've read so far. But then, in all hostage negotiations, the give and take usually has some numerical formula, no matter how disagreeable it may be.

    Good question. Because the Israeli hostages have been kept for 16+ months, perhaps the urgent concern for getting them back alive now, rather than in coffins, made Israel willing to give up many Palestinian prisoners for each of their own people?