More Gaza hostages to be freed as truce deadline nears

CIA Director William Burns has pushed Hamas and Israel to broaden the focus of ongoing hostage negotiations as the US seeks a longer multiday pause in fighting.

The CIA chief met with his Mossad counterpart and Qatar’s prime minister overnight Tuesday AEDT. The current ceasefire will expire in about 24 hours.

Burns is taking into account the Israeli demand that Hamas release at least 10 people for every day there is a break in the war, those familiar with the matter said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to detail sensitive discussions.

He also pushed for the immediate release of American hostages held by Hamas. US officials put the number of those hostages at eight or nine.

Burns has emerged as the main US negotiator in the hostage crisis, valued by President Biden for his broad array of contacts across the Middle East and, in particular, within Israel’s Mossad intelligence service.

“They listen to him and highly respect him,” said a person familiar with the negotiations.

The United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories says she is confident she lifted the tone of debate on the Israel-Hamas conflict during her tour of Australia.

Francesca Albanese visited Australia this month to deliver the Edward Said Memorial Lecture, making several high-profile media appearances including at the National Press Club and the ABC’s Q+A program.

The Italian official said she encountered “misinformed” questioning through her visit which was “not prone to consider the facts at all”.

The human rights lawyer said she sought to offer a more fulsome legal context to the current war, reminding Australians of breaches of international law from Israel, including the annexation of Palestinian land.

Ms Albanese challenges the “self-defence” argument used by Israel as validation for its attacks on Gaza, which it began after Islamist group Hamas launched attacks on Israel last month.

“Israel has the right to protect itself, its territory and its citizens but not its annexation plan,” she said. “It does not have the right to wage a war against the people it keeps under belligerent occupation and blockades.”

Hamas and Israel were expected to release more hostages and prisoners on Wednesday, local time, the last day of a prolonged six-day truce in the Gaza Strip conflict, as attention focused on whether mediator Qatar could negotiate another extension.

Israeli media, citing the prime minister’s office, reported that Israel received a list of hostages expected to be released by Hamas on Wednesday. The prime minister’s office had no immediate comment.

Israel has said the truce could be prolonged further, provided Hamas continues to free at least 10 Israeli hostages per day. But with fewer women and children still in captivity, keeping the guns quiet for longer may require negotiating to free at least some Israeli men for the first time.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas and allied group Islamic Jihad freed 12 hostages on Tuesday, bringing the total released since the truce began on Friday to 81. Those have been mostly Israeli women and children along with foreign citizens.

A short time later, Israel released 30 Palestinians from Ofer Prison in the occupied West Bank and a Jerusalem detention centre. The Palestinian Prisoner’s Club, a semi-official organisation, said half were women and the remainder were teenage males. That brought the total number of Palestinians released under the truce to 180.

Qatar, which mediated indirect talks between Hamas and Israel that resulted in the ceasefire, on Tuesday hosted the spy chiefs from Israel’s Mossad and the United States’ CIA.

The officials discussed possible parameters of a new phase of the truce deal including Hamas releasing hostages who are men or military personnel, not just women and children, a source briefed on the matter said. They also considered what might be needed to reach a ceasefire lasting more than a handful of days.

Qatar spoke to Hamas before the meeting to get a sense of what the group might agree to. The Israelis and Hamas are now internally discussing the ideas explored at the meeting, the source added.

Separately, foreign ministers of the Group of Seven nations on Tuesday called in a joint statement for an extension of the ceasefire and more humanitarian aid.

About 159 hostages remain in Gaza. The White House said on Tuesday this includes eight to nine Americans. U.S. national security spokesperson John Kirby said the U.S. was hopeful Hamas would release more Americans, and the U.S. government would work with Qatar to extend the pause in fighting.

The leaders of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Israel’s Mossad met Qatar’s prime minister in Doha on Tuesday, local time, to build on the two-day extension of a truce between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, a source briefed on the visit said.

The meeting was “to build on the progress of the extended humanitarian pause agreement and to initiate further discussions about the next phase of a potential deal,” the source told Reuters.

CIA Director William Burns, the head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service David Barnea, and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman al-Thani met one day after Qatar announced the two-day extension of an original four-day truce deal in Gaza.

The meeting canvassed possible parameters of a new phase of the truce deal including Hamas releasing hostages who are men or military personnel, not just women and children, the source said. They also considered what might be needed to reach a ceasefire lasting more than a handful of days.

Qatar spoke to Hamas before the meeting to get a sense of what the group might agree to. The Israelis and Hamas are now internally discussing the ideas explored at the meeting, the source added.

The truce has brought the first respite to the Gaza Strip in seven weeks during which Israel bombed the territory heavily in response to a violent rampage on Oct. 7 by Hamas gunmen who killed around 1,200 people and took 240 captives.

Israel has sworn to annihilate Hamas, which rules Gaza. Health authorities in Gaza say Israel’s bombardment of the tiny, densely populated territory has so far killed more than 15,000 people, around 40 per cent of them children.

A Chinese diplomat has poured cold water over Australia’s claims about a naval incident as he prepares to meet the foreign minister.

Penny Wong will host Liu Jianchao, the head of China’s international liaison department, in Canberra later today. Their meeting follows an incident involving a Chinese warship and Australian divers, which took place earlier this month in international waters in Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

The destroyer switched on its undersea sonar while personnel from the Australian HMAS Toowoomba were trying to clear fishing nets from the ship’s propellers. At least one diver sustained minor injuries.

The Australian government has expressed serious concerns to China over what it called unsafe and unprofessional conduct.

Mr Liu suggested the incident arose from Australia’s behaviour in the region that gave “Chinese people a message that Australian naval vessels are there to contain China”.

“What would happen if a Chinese naval ship came to your waters or waters near Australia? Naturally, you send your ships to monitor and identify,” he told the Australia-China Relations Institute.

“We do urge the Australian government and military to act with great prudence in this area.”

Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd reckons California governor Gavin Newsom might be a putative second-choice Democratic candidate for the Oval Office if the president were to decide not to run again.

Rudd praised Newsom’s efforts to “maximise collaboration with the Chinese” and his ability to distance himself from his party’s hardline rhetoric.

Although Newsom, who welcomed Chinese leader Xi Jinping to the San Francisco APEC summit, is not challenging Joe Biden for the nomination, he has not ruled out running if Biden were to withdraw.

“What you say is your party’s or your candidate’s policy towards maintaining a stable relationship with China in the future is separate from the discipline of how you operationalise that in office,” Mr Rudd said. Read more

Anthony Albanese has offered an “unreserved and overdue” apology to survivors of thalidomide, saying governments have let down those affected by the drug.

Sixty-two years to the day the morning sickness drug for pregnant women was withdrawn from sale in Australia because of causing birth defects, Mr Albanese apologised to the survivors of the pharmaceutical disaster.

“We understand an apology does not balance years of inaction and inadequate support. We know the toll of thalidomide is still felt today,” the prime minister told parliament on Wednesday.

“These parents, these mothers did nothing wrong. These parents did not fail their children. The system failed them both.”

A national apology was a key recommendation of a Senate inquiry into thalidomide in 2019.

The powerful political network led by conservative billionaire Charles Koch endorsed Nikki Haley for president on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT), as it looks to stop Donald Trump from being the Republican nominee.

Americans for Prosperity Action, the network’s flagship political group, announced the group’s first endorsement of its type in a presidential race. In 2015, the Koch network identified five approved presidential candidates, all of whom fell to Trump.

The endorsement comes just under seven weeks before the first nominating contest in Iowa, with Trump in command of the race there and in other early states. Read more

Carnival Australia has confirmed two of its largest and internationally-renowned brands – Princess Cruises and Cunard – will no longer sail from Melbourne from the 2025-26 cruise season in response to a huge rise in the state government’s port taxes.

The state government plans to hike fees and charges at the Port of Melbourne by 15 per cent from next year and in response Carnival Australia said it would move to other docks interstate from 2025.

The Tourism & Transport Forum CEO Margy Osmond said it was deeply disappointing. “The value of cruising cannot be underestimated, having contributed nearly $380 million to Victoria’s economy in 2022-23 and helping support jobs across tourism, hospitality, retail and related sectors,” she said.

“Melbourne has already lost the Spirit of Tasmania to Geelong, diverting hundreds of thousands of tourists away from Melbourne, and as result we don’t want to lose any other operators.”

It comes after the Victorian Treasurer yesterday revealed the government would triple its new tax on vacant Melbourne properties following an agreement with the Greens.