Exclusive | Hezbollah cease-fire deal will help Israel finally get back Hamas hostages including Americans UN ambassador tells the Post

WASHINGTON — Israel’s cease-fire agreement with Hezbollah inked Tuesday may grease the wheels on securing the release of the remaining hostages — including four Americans — in Hamas’ custody for more than a year, the Jewish State’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon exclusively told The Post on Wednesday.As hostilities from Lebanon’s Hezbollah into Israel’s north are expected to ease, Danon said it will free up the Jewish State to focus even more of its efforts on returning the hostages taken by Hamas in the horrific Oct.7, 2023, attack on Israeli civilians, which prompted the war.“With Hamas, [the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire] will support our desire to release more hostages,” he said.

“We will be able to focus on Gaza.”At least four American citizens are believed to still be held in captivity by Hamas, along with the bodies of three more who have yet to be retrieved.That’s partly because Israel, through its strategic tactics and slaughtering of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, broke a “linkage” between the Lebanese terror group and Hamas, Danon said.Before his death, Nasrallah had wanted a ceasefire with Hezbollah to be tied to one with Gaza as well.“The power and determination we showed broke that linkage between between Hamas and Hezbollah.and I think today, it allows us to move to focus more on what’s happening in Gaza and to apply more pressure in order to release hostages,” he said.That separation of the proxy groups has dampened Hamas’ aspirations of leading not just its own revolt against Israel, but a larger regional war on the Jewish state, the ambassador said.“I think today [Hamas] realizes that the ambitions that it will be a regional effort against Israel, with Iran and Hezbollah joining them, I think today they realize that it’s not happening,” he said.

“You know, Hezbollah’s out of the game.Hamas also, we proved to them our capabilities.”“So I do think that today, Hamas understands that there’s a...