Israelis and Palestinians rejoiced on Thursday after a ceasefire and hostage deal was announced under the first phase of US President Donald Trump’s initiative to end the war in Gaza.

The enemies both publicly endorsed the deal and had been expected to sign it around noon in the Egyptian beach resort of Sharm el-Sheikh (0900 GMT), though there was no immediate official confirmation that the signing had taken place.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the ceasefire would take effect once ratified by the Israeli government, which would convene after a security cabinet meeting scheduled for 5pm.

Israel’s hostage coordinator Gal Hirsch said the list of the Palestinian prisoners to be freed was still being worked out.

Residents in Gaza reported a series of air strikes on Gaza City around the time it was due to be signed.

Ceasefire, withdrawal, and release of hostages

Under the deal, fighting will cease, Israel will partially withdraw from Gaza and Hamas will free hostages it captured in the attack that precipitated the war, in exchange for prisoners held by Israel.

A source briefed on details of the agreement said Israeli troops would begin pulling back within 24 hours of the deal being signed.

The release of all 20 Israeli hostages still believed to be alive in Gaza is expected on Sunday or Monday, an Israeli official said. Another 26 hostages have been declared dead in absentia and the fate of two is unknown. Hamas has indicated it may take time to recover bodies scattered across Gaza.

Palestinians and the families of Israeli hostages broke into wild celebrations after news emerged of the pact.

In Gaza, where most of the more than 2 million people have been displaced by Israeli bombing, young men applauded in the devastated streets, even as Israeli strikes continued.

‘All of the Gaza Strip is happy’

“Thank God for the ceasefire, the end of bloodshed and killing,” said Abdul Majeed Abd Rabbo in Khan Younis in southern Gaza. “I am not the only one happy, all of the Gaza Strip is happy, all the Arab people, all of the world is happy with the ceasefire and the end of bloodshed.”

Einav Zaugauker, whose son Matan is one of the last hostages, rejoiced in Tel Aviv’s so-called Hostages Square, where families of those seized in the Hamas attack that sparked the war two years ago have gathered to demand their return.

“I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I can’t explain what I’m feeling … it’s crazy,” she said, speaking in the red glow of a celebratory flare.

“What do I say to him? What do I do? Hug and kiss him,” she said. “Just tell him that I love him, that’s it. And to see his eyes sink into mine … It’s overwhelming — this is the relief.”

Still, Gaza residents said Israeli strikes on three Gaza City suburbs continued overnight and in the morning hours of Thursday, residents said, though there were no immediate reports of casualties.

The Gaza health ministry said at least nine Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the past 24 hours.

Just a day after the second anniversary of Hamas’ cross-border attack that triggered Israel’s devastating assault on Gaza, indirect talks in Egypt yielded the agreement as the initial stage of a 20-point framework put forward by Trump.

Major achievement for Trump

The agreement was widely portrayed as a major diplomatic achievement for the US president, who had campaigned on promises to end fighting in Gaza. He cast it as a first step in a plan to bring reconciliation to the wider Middle East.

“All Parties will be treated fairly! This is a GREAT Day for the Arab and Muslim World, Israel, all surrounding Nations, and the United States of America, and we thank the mediators from Qatar, Egypt, and Turkey, who worked with us to make this Historic and Unprecedented Event happen,” he wrote on social media. “BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS!”

But the agreement still left many unresolved questions. Yet to be hammered out are plans to govern Gaza after the war, and the ultimate fate of Hamas, which has rejected Israel’s demands that it give up its weapons.

Netanyahu called the deal “a diplomatic success and a national and moral victory for the State of Israel.”

But far-right members of his coalition have long opposed any deal with Hamas. One, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, said Hamas must be destroyed once the hostages are returned. He would not vote in favour of a ceasefire deal, although he stopped short of threatening to bring down Netanyahu’s coalition.

The deal received a chorus of support from Arab and Western countries which had watched multiple ceasefire efforts fail.

The next phase of Trump’s plan calls for an international body led by Trump, and including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, to play a role in Gaza’s post-war administration.

Arab countries which back the plan say it must lead to eventual independence for a Palestinian state, which Netanyahu says will never happen. Hamas rejects putting Gaza under international rule, and any role for Blair.

More than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s assault on Gaza, launched after Hamas-led members stormed through Israeli towns on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages.

In parallel, Israel’s military has waged campaigns that have tipped the balance of power in the Middle East in its favour, killing the leaders of Hezbollah in a campaign in Lebanon and top Iranian commanders in a 12-day war against Iran.

But global outrage has mounted against Israel’s assault, leaving it internationally isolated.

CHENNAI: Indian police have arrested the owner of a pharmaceutical company after a cough syrup made at his plant was linked to the deaths of at least 21 children, officials said on Thursday.

Most of the children, all aged under five, died in Madhya Pradesh state over the past month after they were prescribed the syrup, which was contaminated with a deadly toxin.

Cough syrups manufactured in India have come under global scrutiny in recent years, with deaths linked to their consumption reported in several countries, damaging its reputation as the third-largest producer of drugs and pharmaceuticals by volume.

G Ranganathan, 75, was arrested early on Thursday morning at his home in Chennai by police from the city and from Madhya Pradesh.

He was charged with culpable homicide not amounting to murder and adulteration of drugs, police sources told AFP, and Indian media reported.

The cough syrup, sold under the brand name Coldrif, was manufactured by Sresan Pharma at a unit in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.

The Indian health ministry said on Saturday that tests on samples showed they were contaminated with diethylene glycol (DEG), a toxic substance used in industrial solvents that can be fatal even if ingested in small amounts.

Madhya Pradesh and several other states have banned the product.

Indian media reports said the World Health Organisation had sought clarification from Indian officials about whether the toxic cough syrup had been exported to other countries.

More than 70 children died in Gambia from acute kidney failure after consuming a cough syrup imported from India in 2022.

In Uzbekistan, 68 children died between 2022 and 2023 after consuming another contaminated syrup produced in India.

The Nobel literature prize to be announced on Thursday is likely to go to a Western male author this year, experts predict, after South Korea’s Han Kang last year became the first Asian woman to win.

Awarding the prize to another woman this year would make history: it has never gone to a woman two years in a row, and women are vastly under-represented among its laureates — just 18 out of 121 since it was first awarded in 1901.

But literary critics in Stockholm told AFP they therefore expect a Western man to get the nod this year, citing Australia’s Gerald Murnane, Romania’s Mircea Cartarescu, Hungary’s Laszlo Krasznahorkai and Peter Nadas as possibilities, as well as Swiss postmodernist Christian Kracht.

Murnane and Krasznahorkai meanwhile, have the lowest odds on betting sites, along with India’s Amitav Ghosh, whose name sailed up just two days before the announcement.

The 18-member Swedish Academy that awards the prize insists it does not take gender, nationality, or language into consideration.

But “even if they say that they don’t think in terms of representation, you can still look at the list (of past laureates) and see that it’s kind of ‘OK, this year was a European, now we can look a little further afield. And now we go back to Europe. Last year was a woman, let’s choose a man this year’,” Sveriges Radio culture critic Lina Kalmteg told AFP.

After a #MeToo scandal that rocked the Academy in 2018, every other laureate has been a woman, suggesting an effort to right past wrongs and improve the gender imbalance.

‘Bizarre masterpiece’

Bjorn Wiman, culture editor at Swedish paper of reference Dagens Nyheter, told AFP he thought this year’s winner would be a man “from the Anglo-Saxon, German or French-language world”.

Christian Kracht, a 58-year-old German-language postmodernist author who writes about pop culture and consumerism, is a favourite in literary circles, he said.

At this year’s Gothenburg Book Fair, held annually a few weeks before the Nobel announcement, “many members of the Swedish Academy were there, sitting in the front row during his event”, Wiman said.

“And that is usually a sure sign,” he said, adding that the same thing happened when Austrian playwright Elfriede Jelinek won the prize in 2004.

Another writer getting a lot of attention in the run-up this year is Australia’s Gerald Murnane.

Born in 1939 in Melbourne, his work draws heavily on his own life experiences.

His novel “The Plains” (1982) delves into Australian landowners’ culture, described by the New Yorker as a “bizarre masterpiece” that feels more like a dream than a book.

“The question is whether he’ll answer the phone (when the Academy calls), I don’t know if he even has one,” joked Josefin de Gregorio, literary critic at Sweden’s other main daily Svenska Dagbladet.

“He’s never left Australia. He lives in the countryside, he doesn’t make himself very accessible,” she said.

“I hope he wins, I want more people to discover his wonderful work,” de Gregorio said.

Australian Aboriginal writer Alexis Wright has also been mentioned.

‘Unthinkable’

Other names that regularly make the rounds are Antiguan-American author Jamaica Kincaid, Canada’s Anne Carson, Chilean’s Raul Zurita, and Argentina’s Cesar Aira.

The last South American to win was Peru’s Mario Vargas Llosa in 2010, and the region could be overdue, Kalmteg told AFP.

She also mentioned Mexican authors Cristina Rivera Garza and Fernanda Melchor.

With no public shortlist and the prize committee’s deliberations sealed for 50 years, it is always difficult to predict which way the Academy is leaning.

It has a penchant for shining a spotlight on writers relatively unknown to a wider public, with Wiman noting that it was previously known for being “openly elitist, artistically”.

“Authors like Han Kang would have been unthinkable five or six years ago,” he said, noting that she was well-established internationally and only 53, while the Academy previously tended to honour older men.

The 2025 winner, who will take home a $1.2 million cheque, will be announced on Thursday at 1:00 pm (1100 GMT).