--:-- Rachel Abrams: From the New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is The Daily.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Hamas is expected to release the remaining hostages by Monday. Israel will also free hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees. Over the past few days, the world has seen dramatic scenes unfold from Israel and Gaza. In Gaza, thousands of Palestinians are returning to their homes and their neighborhoods, and they're seeing firsthand the devastation that two years of war has brought.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: As international journalists continue to wait for access to the Strip, We've also been watching Israel as the country prepares for the return of the remaining hostages taken in the October 7th attack. Today, I talk with families of hostages and other Israelis in what's become known as Hostage Square in Tel Aviv, about this long-anticipated moment, and also with my colleague Isabel Kirshner, about why the hostages have been so pivotal in the efforts to end the war.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: It's Monday, October 13th. Hello, ladies and gentlemen. We welcome you to Ben Guria International Airport here in Kalabin. And our arrival time is approximately 9.00.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: As the ceasefire took effect in Gaza, I flew to Israel with Daily producer Claire Tennesketter to ask people how they're feeling and what they're thinking. So we just got off the plane. We haven't even been walking maybe five minutes. And all along this very brightly lit hallway are pictures of the hostages.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: And within minutes of arriving, we started seeing reminder after reminder of the remaining hostages in Gaza. It lists the ages of the hostages on some of these posters, and some of them are crossed out with new ages as they've, I guess, gotten older.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: This guy, 34, crossed out, 35, crossed out, now it says 36. So as soon as we dropped off our luggage, we went straight to what's become the epicenter of the push to return the hostages to Israel, a place known as Hostage Square.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: It's a concrete public plaza between an art museum and a public library, and it's across the street from the Israeli military's headquarters. And in the weeks and months following October 7th, this place developed into a sort of living, interactive memorial to the hostages that were taken on that day.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: What's going on over in this? So this is actually like a little synagogue. There are big white canvas tents. Some of them are for shade. Some of them are sort of information booths. The tent of prayer and good deeds. T-shirts. Hats, flags. And there are little pop-up stores selling t-shirts and books and pins.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: The yellow ribbons and... But the whole space has become a kind of remembrance area.
--:-- Moshe Lavi: Can you tell us what you're doing? I write a message for the hostages. Every square inch of this place seems like it has a photo of a hostage or a message for them or some kind of memento.
--:-- Moshe Lavi: And there are other things that feel very specific to this place and to this war. There's a piano that anybody can come up and play, because one hostage loved to play the piano.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: Can you describe what we're looking at? It's the remaking of the tunnel. And there's even kind of an interactive, artistic replica of a Hamas tunnel where the hostages are believed to be held.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: I remember the tunnel from the last time I was in Israel, over the summer, when it felt so different. There was no hostage deal in sight. The mood was somber and despondent, angry. But now, coming back... We're very, very, very happy this war is coming to an end.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: The mood was optimistic, and people were excited. We're so happy. So we celebrate. So we are offering a free cake for everyone. Free cake.
--:-- Claire Tennesketter: The other remarkable difference... We really have to thank America for the deal, especially Donald Trump.
--:-- Ruby Chen: Thank you, President Trump, because we want him to know that we are thanking him from the bottom of our house. Thank you.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: The square is where the families of the hostages have come since the beginning of the war, demanding that the military and the government bring their loved ones home. And it's also where thousands of supporters and protesters have come to weekly rallies to show solidarity and support for those families.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And so after we spent some time taking in the scene, we asked a few family members to talk to us about how they were feeling just hours before the final hostages were supposed to come home.
--:-- Ruby Chen: I'm a New Yorker, grew up in Flatbush. And I met my wife in Israel, and we decided to have our home here.
--:-- Ruby Chen: Ruby and his wife raised their three kids in Israel, but would frequently travel to the U.S. My eldest inherited my love for the New York Knicks and Itai as being the middle son, the more rebellious one.
--:-- Ruby Chen: He decided to be a Celtics fan, for the love of God. I don't know how that happened, but I feel that I failed as a father.
--:-- Ruby Chen: And when the war broke out, one of his sons, Itai, the one with the rebellious streak, was performing his mandatory military service. And he, unlike his elder sibling that went to a technology unit, he, of course, decided to do something totally different, and he wanted to go into combat.
--:-- Ruby Chen: And he joined the tanks division, and he, on that fatal October 7th, was on the border of Gaza at a base called Nahal Oz, which is kind of in the middle of the Gaza Strip. and they were ambushed.
--:-- Ruby Chen: They got hit by a few anti-tank missiles and the tank was neutralized. And we were totally in the dark.
--:-- Ruby Chen: Monday, we went to the missing people command center that was put together by the police. And they said, well, he's missing in action, meaning no one is able to identify him physically standing next to him.
--:-- Ruby Chen: He wasn't in one of the hospitals. And a few days after, we got notified that he is indeed a hostage in Gaza. And we're sitting there. And, OK, do you have anything else to tell us? Where is he now?
--:-- Ruby Chen: Oh, we don't know. OK, then we're doing it.
--:-- Ruby Chen: So they waited, hoping for a positive sign, desperate for information on how their son was doing. In March 24, we got another knock on the door. Then, a few months later, Ruby got a very different message.
--:-- Ruby Chen: When the IDF concluded, based on intelligence, that he most likely did not survive on October 7th. And we asked, okay, where's the physical evidence? He says, oh, we don't have that.
--:-- Ruby Chen: So we understand, we looked at, I looked at the intelligence. I understand that most likely Tai is not one of the 20, but he is no less of a hostage.
--:-- Ruby Chen: you know there's the missing holidays you know thanksgiving to hanukkah to you know easter and just you know think of a family dinner holiday dinner with a chair that is empty you know itai going back to the celtics you know now is the beginning of basketball season we would be sitting on the couch you know thinking about and jabbing one another who has a better chance of winning the division title and we will play NBA 2k and he will play with the Celtics and play with the Knicks.
--:-- Ruby Chen: He would of course beat me because he's much better at 2k than I am and he's missing. It is just as important to us to get Itai back and then we'll deal with the two options that we have, either being able to hug him, or it means that one chapter ended and we need to start another chapter of our family.
--:-- Ruby Chen: But we need to have that ending of this chapter. Thank you so much.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Some of the family members at the square have the answers that people like Ruby are dreading. They know that their relatives are dead, but they come here for different reasons. They come to support other people. They come out of a sense of solidarity.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: They come because they understand what it means to wait for these kinds of answers and to finally get them.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: Okay. So my name is Karmit Palti-Katzir. I'm the daughter of Rami-Katzir, who was murdered on October 7th in Kibbutz Niroz.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: My mother, Hannah Katzir, was abducted from Kibbutz Niroz, and my brother, Elad, was also kidnapped from Kibbutz Niroz.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: My mom returned after 49 days in captivity in Gaza, and my brother, Elad, was murdered in captivity, and his body was retrieved to Israel in April 2024.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: When my mother came back, I remember when she was brought on a gurney and she looked up and she saw me and she saw my sister. And then I could see that she's looking about the missing faces.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: She couldn't see my father and she couldn't see my brother. And she asked me, where are they? And I have to tell her, like, on the first five minutes, she's with us, that my father, her husband was shot to death and that my brother, for me it was good news.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: I told her mom, but you know the good news is that he's kidnapped and he's alive and it's crazy that even considered to be a good news, but for us it was a good news.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: I remember when they told us that he's dead. So my mom, she was in the hospital at the time and she told the officer that she wants her son, my brother, to be brought to her so she can kiss him goodbye.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: And then the officer was shocked and he told her like, we can't bring him over. You can't kiss him goodbye because his body wasn't in a state that she could have done that.
--:-- Karmit Palti-Katzir: And it's awful because the sense of closure, it's not full because we don't get to have these normal phases of grief and goodbye.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Meanwhile, Karmit's mom was struggling more and more with her health, suffering from ailments related to her captivity.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: She steadily declined and passed away last year. It's a huge difference between what I've been through with my father or my brother or with her, because with her we have the opportunity and the privilege to say goodbye, to say how much we love her, to hold her hands, for her not to feel alone for a second.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And we didn't have that with my brother and we didn't have that with my father. And this makes this feeling of closure very different.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: The people here, the families, there are so many families who are anticipating having their loved ones returned. What does that feel like as somebody that also was in that position?
--:-- Rachel Abrams: I'm struggling all the time for 736 days today. I'm fighting for the release of all hostages. This is my main goal in life. And of course, I'm so thrilled that it's finally happening.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: but of course like emotionally it's so complicated because you know tomorrow people are going to hug their loved ones and I not going to have this hug forever
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I feel that this war has been too much and too long and too devastating, both for Israelis and for Palestinians, for Gazan people.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I feel like the loss and the ruins both in Israel and in Gaza, it will take years and decades to rebuild something new.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I'm not talking about the house or the homes or the neighborhoods. I'm talking about the possibility of living one next to each other
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And I feel like there is a crisis of trust or of confidence between the Israeli people and its leadership.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So I feel that in the end of the war, none of us is feeling more safe. And it's sad to say that.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Coming up next, I speak with my colleague Isabel Kirshner on what the return of the hostages means more broadly for Israeli society and for the end of the war.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: We are speaking at this moment when there are enormous scenes unfolding, not just where you and I are in Israel, but also in Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of people are going back to their homes and their neighborhoods, which have been largely destroyed to try to figure out how to start rebuilding their lives.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And international journalists are still waiting for access to Gaza. We're not allowed in there.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: In the meantime, I wanted to come to Israel, where there was this seismic event happening, which is the return of the hostages.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So just to start, can you remind us who are the hostages as a whole?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So the hostages were taken captive during the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And at the time, about 250 people were taken captive and taken back to Gaza.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: They included many civilians, women, children, grandparents, and some soldiers.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: In the intervening two years of war, we've had in the past two brief temporary ceasefires where some hostages were exchanged for some Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And the women and children, for the most part, were returned.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Some of the younger men who were considered to be in the most vulnerable states physically were returned.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And what we're expecting is early Monday morning for the 20 live hostages to all be returned, more or less at the same time.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: They're mainly men, mostly young men, mostly civilians, and a small number of soldiers.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And then the remains of 26 more people who were either killed or died in captivity.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Some are supposed to also be returned later in the day on Monday.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: But the authorities have been saying that it will be much harder to locate all the remains.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Some might be buried in places that very few people know where they are.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And so it could take much longer to return all of them.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Can you remind us, Isabel, how these hostage returns have worked in the past just mechanically?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So in the past, what we've seen largely are these ceremonies where Hamas militants would, kind of in a show of force, build a stage and bring out some of the hostages in small groups surrounded by masked gunmen.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Sometimes be made to wave to the crowd or to give little speeches.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: is this time around, we understand that Hamas is supposed to not be holding these ceremonies.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So we might not see very much at the beginning, but the idea is they will be handed over to representatives of the Red Cross in Gaza.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: They will then be transported and handed over to Israeli military and will be brought over the border into an Israeli military base called Re'im, which is in southern Israel.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And that's where they usually get their initial checks to see what their condition is and are reunited with close family members.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And, you know, you ask what's different this time.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So much is different this time.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I mean, for one thing, these hostages have been in captivity for two years.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So nobody really knows what their condition is.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: We've seen some hostage videos released by Hamas over the months where some have appeared extremely emaciated and skeletal and very, very distressed.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And, you know, it's very unclear what the condition will be of those coming out alive.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And for the Palestinians too, the Israelis are releasing more than 200 Palestinian prisoners who were convicted of life terms for serious deadly attacks against Israelis, plus almost 2,000, about 1,700 plus detainees from Gaza who were detained by Israeli forces during the war and brought to Israel.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So it's a very large landmark occasion on all sides.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: One of our producers, Claire Tennisgetter, and I spent last night, Saturday night, at Hostage Square, where there have been weekly rallies in support of bringing the hostages home since the beginning of the war.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And last night was one of, if not the biggest crowd that has ever been there, according to a bunch of different reports.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Can you talk about the significance of the hostages to the war and to Israeli society and how that's changed since the start of all of this?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Well, there's an ethos in Israel that's largely been nurtured through the Israeli military, which is a conscription army.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So, you know, most people in Israel, their children or their siblings, somebody they know, their neighbors, will be serving or will have been serving in the military.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And the ethos, because it's a so-called people's army particularly, has been that you never leave soldiers behind in the field.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And there's been a feeling that's grown over the two years as these captives have languished longer and longer, that the Israeli government had essentially abandoned these people and left them in the field.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: So the square has become a kind of fulcrum of anger and frustration as successive rounds of hostage talks collapsed and ceasefires collapsed and this war seemed to be turning into a forever war
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And now, of course, you know, you experienced a complete flip and switch in the atmosphere to actually seeing some light at the end of this and seeing the hostages about to come back and seeing this war end, which a majority of Israelis has been calling for.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I mean, in every single opinion poll for months and months and months, you've had a majority cutting across political lines saying that they favored prioritizing a hostage deal and a return of the hostages over continuing the war.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: I was really struck by how many people were carrying signs saying, thank you, Mr. President, with pictures of President Trump on them.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: There was one guy actually dressed as President Trump holding a sign that said Nobel Peace Prize, like indicating he should get it, which obviously a lot of people have talked about how he wants to get the Nobel Peace Prize.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And in the speeches that we heard, particularly in Steve Whitcoff's speech, that's the Middle East envoy for the Trump administration, every time Whitcoff mentioned Trump, the crowd would go nuts and cheer and clap.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And every time Whitcoff mentioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, people would boo.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: And I wonder what you make of that.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Yeah, that was quite stunning to see, actually, Rachel.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I mean, the cheer that went up as Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump walked through the crowd and took the podium and the electrifying atmosphere.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And yes, this massive gratitude and appreciation of the Trump administration's role and President Trump personally in getting this done.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And then, as you mentioned, you know, this extended, prolonged booing that accompanied every time Wyckoff mentioned Netanyahu's name.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: There's a lot of anger still against the government for Netanyahu's refusal to take responsibility personally for, you know, the failures, the intelligence failures, the policy failures that occurred on his watch.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And, you know, I think that's what you were seeing last night in the square.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And there was immediately afterward a lot of discussion on the panel shows on TV about, you know, whether it was appropriate or not.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: But it was just a very genuine, authentic, spontaneous response.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And nobody had planned it or rehearsed it.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And I think it was just, you know, very reflective of how people have felt here.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: What are we watching for now? What are people expecting to happen next?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Yeah, that's the golden question. Nobody really knows.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: This deal, it was very vague.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Other than the first phase of it, which is the hostage for Palestinian prisoner exchange and an increase in aid going into the Gaza Strip, as well as an Israeli pullback.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: There's already been an initial pullback of forces to a defense line within the Gaza Strip.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: But beyond that, there are a lot of open questions which do raise concerns about the fragility of such a deal.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And I think that's why we're also seeing on Monday, after President Trump makes this sort of lightning four hour visit to Israel, he's then going on to Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt for what he's calling a peace summit led by himself and the president of Egypt, where they've invited world leaders and the Arab partners to sort of buttress and support this deal.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: And I think, you know, the idea is just to create a stronger coalition as possible and as broad as possible of countries who are just going to try and make sure that this holds.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I mean, whatever happens next, clearly people in Israel, at least, are celebrating the end of the war.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: It feels to them like we have reached the end of the war with this first phase.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Does that seem fair to you?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Yes, I think Israelis, for the large part, are relieved after two years.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: There's little appetite in Israel to continue fighting.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: It's a very Sisyphean task, really. You're in an insurgency situation and it just seems to be a kind of stalemate.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: But does it mean peace? Does it mean the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been resolved?
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Absolutely not.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: I mean, the fundamental issues remain, but it certainly brings this two-year chapter to some kind of close, however unclear the future looks.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Isabel, thank you so much.
--:-- Isabel Kirshner: Thank you.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Early Friday morning, thousands of people had already gathered in Hostage Square. So happy right now. I stayed awake all night just to see it, everything. It's amazing that everybody's coming back. And news broke that the first group of hostages had returned to Israel, starting an exchange for Palestinian prisoners and detainees that was expected to begin later in the day.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: It's a great feeling, great feeling. We waited so long for this. It's wonderful. And thanks to Trump.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: The crowd packed the square, waiting for updates on the remaining hostages, who were expected to return home to a changed country.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: My emotions are very mixed. We're happy, but we are also concerned, sad. We have now to start to work on other things, and the story is not over.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: We'll be right back.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Here's what else you need to know today.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Over the weekend, President Trump said that he would pay members of the military during the government shutdown, tapping into about $8 billion of Pentagon funds.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: It would cover the next pay period for more than a million active duty service members.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: but it's not clear how long the administration could pay troops if Congress and the White House can't reach a spending deal.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Meanwhile, the Smithsonian Institution said on Sunday that the shutdown has forced it to close its 21 museums and the National Zoo.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: Today's episode was produced by Claire Tennis-Getter, Rob Zipko, and Michael Simon-Johnson.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: It was edited by Patricia Willans and Ben Calhoun and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley.
--:-- Rachel Abrams: That's it for The Daily. I'm Rachel Abrams. See you tomorrow.
