Iran Update, January 27, 2025
Siddhant Kishore, Katherine Wells, Andie Parry, Kelly Campa, Avery Borens, and Brian Carter
Information Cutoff: 2:00pm ET
The Critical Threats Project (CTP) at the American Enterprise Institute and the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) publish the Iran Update, which provides insights into Iranian and Iranian-sponsored activities that undermine regional stability and threaten US forces and interests.
Click here to see CTP and ISW’s interactive map of Israeli ground operations, and here to see CTP and ISW’s interactive map of the ongoing opposition offensive in Syria. These maps are updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.
We do not report in detail on war crimes because these activities are well-covered in Western media and do not directly affect the military operations we are assessing and forecasting. We utterly condemn violations of the laws of armed conflict and the Geneva Conventions and crimes against humanity even though we do not describe them in these reports.
Gazan civilians began to return to the northern Gaza Strip on January 27 after Hamas fulfilled outstanding obligations under the ceasefire agreement.[1] Hamas agreed to release a female civilian hostage held by Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) after the IDF prevented Palestinians from returning to the northern Gaza Strip on January 25 and 26.[2] The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) announced that Hamas would release the hostage and two additional Israeli hostages on January 30.[3] This is in addition to the three hostages Hamas will release on February 1.[4] Hamas also provided Israel with a list that confirmed 18 of the 26 remaining hostages scheduled for release during the first phase of the ceasefire are alive.[5] The list did not specify which specific individuals were and were not alive, however.
PIJ’s failure to release the hostage is unlikely to be a result of friction between PIJ and Hamas. PIJ has previously released hostages as part of the November 2023 ceasefire agreement and it has not engaged Israeli forces in the strip during the ceasefire, which indicates that PIJ continues to cooperate with Hamas.[6] Hamas released four female Israeli soldiers as part of the second hostage release on January 25 before PIJ agreed to release the fifth hostage.[7] Hamas leads a 12-member coalition of Palestinian militias that allows Hamas to coordinate operations between various Palestinian militias in the Gaza Strip.[8] The breakdown surrounding the release of the fifth hostage on January 25 could be the result of a breakdown in the coordination mechanisms within this coalition, rather than a disagreement between the two factions. IDF operations have probably weakened the institutional coordination mechanisms between the two factions on the ground in the strip.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) withdrew from the Netzarim Corridor on January 27 to allow Gazans to return to the northern Gaza Strip via established routes.[9] The IDF withdrew from the corridor two days later than mandated under the ceasefire because Hamas violated the ceasefire agreement on January 25 by failing to release a hostage.[10] Gazans began returning to the northern Gaza Strip on foot via al Rashid Road, which is the coastal road that connects the northern and southern Gaza Strip.[11] US and Egyptian private security contractors started operating a checkpoint on the Netzarim Corridor along the Salah al Din Road where they will inspect Palestinian vehicles returning to the northern Gaza Strip.[12] The IDF Arabic-language spokesperson issued instructions to Gazans as they returned to the northern strip and prohibited returnees from carrying weapons.[13] The spokesperson reiterated the IDF’s warnings that asked Gazans to avoid Israeli forces. Social media footage showed a large number of Palestinians moving to the northern Gaza Strip uninspected as several Hamas fighters greeted them along al Rashid Road.[14]
The return of Gazans to the northern Gaza Strip will make it difficult for the IDF to conduct operations with the same intensity as it did before the ceasefire if Israel and Hamas fail to agree on a second-phase ceasefire.[15] Relatively few Gazans remained in the northern Gaza Strip after months of intense Israeli combat operations.[16] The lack of civilians enabled Israeli forces to operate more freely with a decreased risk that Israeli troops would encounter civilians. The return of approximately 650,000 Gazans will significantly increase th...
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