Sunday, January 26

Hamas has released an additional four hostages as part of their ceasefire deal with Israel, who have sent them over 200 prisoners of war in exchange.

On January 19, a 42-day ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas took effect, finally bringing some temporary peace to a region that had been stricken by war for over 15 months. The deal was negotiated by Egypt and Qatar in the Qatari capital city of Doha and consists of three phases. The first phase contains the aforementioned 42-day ceasefire and has secured the gradual release of 33 Israeli hostages from Gaza. Meanwhile, Israel will release over 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and withdraw their forces from the strip. Details on the second and third phases have not been released yet, as those phases will be negotiated later on during the first phase.

A day later, the first three hostages were released by Hamas, while Israel returned 90 Palestinian prisoners. Aid also began pouring into Gaza, which is still experiencing a dire humanitarian crisis as starvation and dehydration continue, and disease is on the rise.

The next hostage exchange was scheduled for yesterday, and the entire operation was mostly successful. Four female hostages were returned to Israel in exchange for over 200 Palestinians, many of which were in prison for attacking or murdering Israeli citizens. However, Israel has exiled those criminals abroad, meaning that they will never be allowed to return to their homes in Jerusalem.

The four women were all teenagers who had been recently inducted into the military when Hamas attacked on October 7, 2023, storming the Nahal Oz base just across the border from Gaza City. Over 50 soldiers were killed at the base, and a total of seven soldiers were kidnapped by Hamas.

The entire exchange was facilitated by Hamas operatives, who were clothed in military uniforms and black masks to conceal their identities. The hostages were sent over to the Red Cross, who brought them to Israeli forces.

Unfortunately, there was one issue with the exchange. Israel later stated that there was another 29-year-old female citizen, Arbel Yehud, slated to return with the other four soldiers, but she had not been released. Later on, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement (PIJ) claimed that she is alive and that they are holding Yehud captive, putting the matter out of Hamas' hands. There is no evidence to prove their statement, though.

Despite this, Israel has confirmed that they will continue to block Palestinians from returning to their homes in the northern part of the Gaza Strip until the missing hostage is sent back to Israel.

Fact of the Day (Reader's Digest): Scientists believe that the extreme temperatures and intense pressures within planets like Uranus and Neptune can crush carbon atoms, causing it to rain diamonds. They have also discovered that it can occasionally rain diamonds on other gas giants like Saturn as well, and this could be a normal phenomenon throughout the universe.

Quote of the Day (Gracious Quotes): Life isn’t about finding yourself; it’s about creating yourself. So live the life you imagined. (Henry David Thoreau)

Word of the Day (Merriam-Webster): Nomenclature (noun, NOH-mun-klay-cher) - Nomenclature is a formal word that refers to a system of names that is used in specialized fields and especially in science. Nomenclature is also used more broadly as a synonym of name and designation.

In a Sentence: It took Faith, a trained herpetologist, a while to become familiar with the nomenclature used at the entomology conference.