The race is on to save hostages taken by Hamas before tanks roll into Gaza – after a deal fell through to free fifty

The hostages are in a desperate race against time as negotiators work to get them ahead of Israel’s assault on Gaza.

After an American mother and daughter were released on Friday, a deal to free another 50 prisoners is said to have collapsed last night.

With 201 prisoners, including seven British, still being held, backchannel conversations are underway around the clock before the Israeli army descends to ‘destroy’ Hamas in a full-scale invasion.

Tearful families spoke last night of their fears as the governments of the US, Britain and other countries reportedly put pressure on Israel to delay air, sea and land attacks to give the dealmakers more time. Israeli tanks are on full alert along the border.

Yesterday in Cairo, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly called for “discipline, professionalism and restraint” from the Israeli army as he accepted the country’s right to self-defence following the October 7 massacres.

British hostage negotiators are believed to have been lining up to help broker a deal with Hamas to release British citizens.

Among the British prisoners is Nadav Popplewell, 51, from Wakefield, who was taken away with his 79-year-old mother Channah Peri. The terrorists taunted Nadav’s sister Ayelet Svatitzky by sending her selfies from her mother’s phone with the caption “Hamas.”

Last night, Ms Svatitzky, who lives in northern Israel, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘I trust that the British government will do everything it can to rescue the hostages. But I also accept that I have no control over when the troops come in. I will only pray for the safe return of my mother and brother.”

She also spoke about her health concerns for the pair, who are believed to be being held in a booby-trapped Hamas bunker: “My mother is a very elderly lady with diabetes who requires insulin and has recently lost the sight in her eye.”

Yesterday, the father of kidnapped American Natalie Shoshana Raanan, 17, told reporters she was “doing very well” after being released with her mother Judith Tai Raanan, 59. Uri Raanan, 71, said: ‘I’m going to hug her and kiss her, and it’s going to be the best day of my life.’

The Raanans were taken to an Israeli military base where relatives were waiting and spoke by phone with President Joe Biden.

They are believed to have undergone medical checks before a debriefing with FBI and Israeli intelligence experts. The two women may have “crucial operational intelligence,” a former Western security official said. “This is information, however small, that cannot wait, is vital to the immediate situation and must be gathered now. The first debriefing may take more than two days.

“(The debriefers) will want to know anything that can be revealed about the condition and whereabouts of the other hostages, confirmation of who is being held together. The women can remember sounds of what was happening outside where they were being held, and who is in charge of the unit where they were being held.” The source added that it is possible that MI6 and the CIA are also involved.

In a statement on Friday, Hamas said it was working with mediators in Egypt, Qatar and other “friendly countries” to release more hostages “if and when security conditions allow.” But a deal between the US, Israel and Qatar that would have resulted in the release of 50 hostages fell through, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Informed sources told the newspaper that Hamas leaders had refused any talk about the hostages during the first week of the conflict. Strangely, they weren’t even sure where all the kidnapped people were, as some had been snatched by ordinary Palestinians who burst through the border fence during the terror attacks.

It is feared that many hostages are being held to act as ‘human shields’ in the expected invasion. Families of the prisoners desperately begged the Israelis for more time to free them before it started.

Rachel Goldberg, 54, the mother of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, a festival goer who was last seen being loaded into a truck by terrorists, told the MoS yesterday: ‘It’s clear that if your child is sitting on the street and you see a truck coming, it is normal to say ‘please pump the brakes’.’

She said: “Obviously we are extremely happy for the Raanan family. As soon as we heard that they finally got good news, we were in tears of joy for them.

“We’re still in the realm of complete obscurity for Hersh. What we gathered from people who were with him is that he was in hiding and Hamas was throwing hand grenades inside. We know that his left arm was torn off at the elbow and that he was put on a Hamas pickup truck.

‘When you hear that about your child, it is pure fear. He may have bled from his wound, or he may now be living in Gaza in terrible pain without the medical care he needs.

“I have to keep the mother’s hope that he’s alive and strong and surviving.”

Aid arrives amid border chaos

There was chaos at the Gaza-Egypt border crossing yesterday as essential aid was finally allowed in but foreign passport holders were denied entry.

Hundreds of expats were denied entry to the besieged enclave, but the Rafah crossing was opened for aid. Twenty trucks brought a lifeline to Gazan civilians trapped in the conflict between Israel and the Hamas terror group that controls Gaza.

The aid convoy was the first to arrive since the chaos broke out two weeks ago. But while the trucks brought 3,000 tons of food and medicine, Palestinian authorities said this was only three percent of daily supplies.

Gaza’s 2.3 million residents are rationing food and drinking polluted water. And hospitals say they are running low on medical supplies and fuel for emergency generators due to a nationwide power outage.