The devil in the details: What's in a deal?

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00:00on this. France 24's International Affairs Editor Lila Jacinto joins me on set. Hi, Lila.

00:05So can you talk us through perhaps some of the details of the deal? What are the expectations?

00:09Is it going to happen? Is it going to happen? Well, the most important thing about this deal

00:13is it's pretty much the same deal that was agreed in May. This is what U.S. President Joe Biden said

00:20and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well confirmed that, you know, the same deal could

00:26have been got through in May. Primarily, the most important thing about this is that this is a

00:32phased ceasefire. And when you're talking about a phased deal, implicit in that is that the most

00:38difficult issues have been put to a further stage. You know, the most thorny issues that can has been

00:44kicked down the road. And and therein lies all the devil of the deal, because in the initial phases,

00:52you know, things can be worked. But, you know, this has this has dogged Middle East peace processes

00:57from for decades, you know, since Oslo. The most difficult things are kicked down and it never

01:02reaches the end because the entire process collapses. So in terms of the phases, we have

01:09three phases. The first phase, which is going to begin tomorrow at 830 a.m. local time, is when

01:17the guns will go silent on both sides, hopefully, and humanitarian aid will start to to pour into

01:26the Gaza Strip. The critical thing then starts probably by late afternoon or evening when there

01:33will be a hostage for prisoner release exchange. Now, the first phase is supposed to last six weeks

01:41or 42 days. And in this six weeks, Hamas is supposed to be releasing 33 Israeli hostages,

01:49either they're alive or human remains. There are still around 60 more other hostages which will not

01:56be tackled in the first phase in exchange for the release of these hostages, which will be in a

02:03phased manner over six weeks. Israel is going to release nearly 1900 detainees from Israeli jail,

02:13and these include around 730 what they call security prisoners. And Israel has released

02:20the names of these prisoners. They can they can be petitioned and go to the courts. The rest are

02:26just detainees who were detained after the October 7th attacks, as well as people who were released

02:34in November 2023 and then re-arrested. So all this will take place. Now, the second phase has not

02:42been negotiated. And this is where it all starts getting very critical. The negotiations for phase

02:48two will only start on the 16th day. That's after the second week when the ceasefire deal

02:56has gone into operation. And, you know, we have the text of what the second phase is. The second

03:02phase involves Israel withdrawing entirely from the Gaza Strip, a complete end to the war,

03:10and Hamas releasing all hostages. But there's really what we don't see is a bridge between

03:18how the first phase can lead to the second phase. And so most analysts are sort of skeptical about

03:26the move to the second phase. As for the third phase, that's really we're looking into years of

03:31that, which is the reconstruction of Gaza. So, you know, this is this this has some pretty minute

03:38details for the first stage. And then as it goes into the third phase, very little details at all

03:45and no sense of how to even get to those phases.

03:49Lila Jacinto, thank you very much.

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