A fragile truce between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group seems to have escaped a breakdown that could have had negative repercussions on long-distance traffic in the Red Sea.
Israel’s government said on Friday that three hostages captured by Hamas in its raid on Israeli soil in October 2023 are expected to be released on 15 February, as initially planned under a ceasefire deal that went into effect last month.
“Sasha Troufanov (29), Iair Horn (46) and Sagui Dekel Chen (36) are the three Israeli hostages expected to be released this Saturday, in the fifth deal between Israel and Hamas,” the Israeli government press office said in a social media post.
Hamas had said on 10 February that it would delay the scheduled release of three hostages, citing Israeli violations over the shipment of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.
Hamas’ announcement had led both Israel and the US to warn that the ceasefire would end, with US President Donald Trump even urging Israel to call off the deal if Hamas did not release all 76 Israeli hostages still in Hamas captivity.
A breakdown of the Gaza agreement could lead the Houthis to resume their campaign against Western shipping in the Red Sea, which the Yemeni group said began in October 2023 in support of Hamas.
Even with the ceasefire surviving, however, shipping companies are in no way rushing back to the Red Sea.
TradeWinds reported as early as 4 February that those sailings through the waterway did not pick up after the ceasefire, based on aggregate Suez Canal transit data compiled by Clarksons.
The London brokerage confirmed that analysis in its own research of the data issued on 14 February.
About half of the pre-crisis traffic continues to be rerouted around Africa, supporting tonne-miles and shipping companies’ earnings.
The danger of a ceasefire collapse looked great enough earlier this week for even United Nations secretary general Antonio Guterres to weigh in.
“We must avoid at all costs resumption of hostilities in Gaza that would lead to immense tragedy,” Guterres said in a social media post on 11 February.(Copyright)
