Hamas now says it doesn’t have 40 Israeli hostages to hand over

The Gaza-based terrorist group on Wednesday told negotiators in Cairo that it was unable to track down and assemble 40 hostages to hand over to Israel for a proposed six-week ceasefire, according to a CNN report. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that no cease-fire can begin without the release of hostages. Israel has said that 133 hostages still remain in Gaza.

Were there any other significant developments on Wednesday? The Israel Defense Forces confirmed that it had killed three sons of Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas’ Political Bureau, in an airstrike. The Turkish government issued a statement saying that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had offered his condolences to Haniyeh over the phone, promising that Israel would pay the price for the deaths.

Dig deeper: Read William Inboden’s column in WORLD Opinions about a recent United Nations resolution calling for a cease-fire in Gaza and how it effectively endorses Hamas.