Tonight's hostage deal, which Israel's cabinet just approved a few minutes ago, calls for a four day pause in Israeli military operations in Gaza. Now, before the break, Barack Ravi told us that his sources say that military engagement will not stop until the first child hostage crosses the border from Gaza into Israel. CNN's Jeremy Dimon is in southern Israel at a vantage point right near the Gaza border, can see into Gaza, and has been watching much of the fighting over the last several days and weeks. Jeremy, what are you hearing tonight?

Well, just as you were coming to me, John, we heard the sound of outgoing artillery. And moments after this deal was approved by the Israeli government, we heard several barrages of outgoing artillery in the direction of the Gaza Strip. An indication that the military activity by the Israeli military will indeed continue until this. Pause goes into effect until those hostages are released from and also, one clear point that the Israeli Prime Minister made this evening was that even as he was urging his cabinet to approve this deal, he was also making clear that the war will continue after this pause ends. We also need to be clear that if you look at the past of this Israeli Palestinian conflict, typically before there is a ceasefire, before there is any kind of pause in fighting, there is an uptick in military activity. So we're very much here waiting and watching for that possibility. But, John, I do also want to tell you about a conversation I just had with Gal Hirsch, who is the Israeli Prime Minister's special coordinator for hostages. He just told me moments ago about this deal, about the discussions in the cabinet meeting where he said that only two ministers voted against this proposed deal.

He said that the Finance Minister Smotrich, who appeared to be indicating his objections to this deal, actually ended up voting in favor of it. And he also told me that he delivered a message just about a half hour ago to the families of some of these hostages, telling them that the State of Israel will do everything to bring all of the hostages back home. And he really did want to emphasize that this deal for 50 hostages in exchange for a four day pause in fighting, as well as three Palestinian prisoners for every civilian hostage released from Gaza, that this deal is only the first phase of these negotiations. He really wanted to emphasize that the Israeli government's position is that they want to get all of the hostages back and that this military campaign, that these negotiations will not end until that happens.

Jeremy, I am curious. You said the official with Prime Minister Benjamin Bentanyahu said that he had spoken to the families of the hostages. We had the granddaughter of one hostage on about 20 minutes ago, and she said she's had no communication whatsoever from the Prime Minister's office. So how is the prime minister, insofar as we know, reaching out.

Yeah. So this is Galhersh. He is the special coordinator for hostages for the Prime Minister. He didn't say exactly how, but he said he delivered a message to the families of these hostages. And what's also clear is that they don't know yet exactly which families of hostages are going to see their loved ones released. He would not get into that. But I also think it was interesting that when he was talking about the 50 individuals who will get out, he said children and their mothers. We have been reporting that it would be children and women. But I think it was really interesting that he was specifying that it would be children and their mothers. We know, of course, of multiple cases of children who are being held hostage in Gaza and who were taken hostage with their mothers as well. And so that may give us some indication of the families that are most likely to get out in this first round of hostage releases over these four days for those 50 different individuals. That is perhaps an indication there.

All right, Jeremy Diamond right on the border between Israel and Gaza, where artillery fire has continued even after the deal has been reached. Jeremy, thank you very much for your reporting. With me now is Rami IGRA, former chief of the hostages and Mia unit of the Mossad and retired US. Army major General James Spider Marks, a CNN military analyst. Rami, let me start with you. You've been skeptical of the possibility of this deal as it was being negotiated. Now that they have reached a deal, what are your opinions on it?

This deal has been negotiated on the basis that the Hamas wants a ceasefire. Hamas wants to be saved from the Israeli military. On the other hand, the Israeli military is determined to eradicate the Hamas. It is not something that we want to do. It's something that we have to do. There is no way that Israel can continue living in any form with Hamas over the border. Now, this deal was reached because of Israeli public opinion and the belief that the moral duty that the government has is such that it overrides. The main objective of this war and the main objective of this war is to eradicate the Hamas. It is a very bad deal for Israel in many, many ways. First of all, militarily, it's not an easy deal. How are they going to restart the war in four or five days? Secondly, we know that the Hamas is going to play all kinds of tricks on the way, trying to release less kidnapped personnel than it has. And secondhand, it is not an easy deal on the Israeli internal front. Remember, there are families that their loved ones are not going to be released, and there are families that have soldiers in the Gaza Strip, and they know fighting in the Gaza Strip in four days time.

Or in five days time is going to be a lot more difficult than it is right now.

General Marks, we've talked about this. What is the military impact of a multi day pause?

The primary impact is that the IDF loses targetable intelligence. It starts to atrophy. The intelligence that they've gathered over the course of days in Gaza begins to crumble around them, because over this pause, Hamas will resupply, reposition, do everything in their power to increase their security. And let there be no doubt, this is not being done by Hamas for any humanitarian reasons. This is a transaction to them. And I think we're at the point where the military's got a very, very tough decision to make. You're in me, you're in Gaza, you're exposed. You've got Hamas all around. You still active in the tunnel network system. It's not been completely taken over by the Israelis by any means. And so these Israeli soldiers are targets. That's the challenge. And then at the end of a certain amount of time, as has been described, that four days could turn into five or to six days. If they continue to move hostages back across into Israel, that becomes a very tough military task. The Israelis at that point are going to have to transition into a defensive posture. Pause is not a military term. You attack or you defend.

They're going to have to start to defend. That changes the mission set entirely. This becomes a very, very difficult task for military commanders to execute.

Rami is there anything that the Israeli military or Israeli government can do? What can they do to make sure that Hamas lives up to its side of the deal?

Hamas is not trustworthy, as you can understand. It's a terror group run by a psychopath, and they're going to do anything in their power to kill Israeli soldiers and to continue to continue regrouping and restrengthening themselves as they can. But the Israeli army has already said that if any breach of the agreement, even the smallest breach, it will go back into fighting full force. Saying that, I don't see the Israeli military doing that if there's any more hostages to be had, and this is where we are, we're a very difficult situation where this deal is a bad deal, but we have to go through it in order to release our people, and this is our moral obligation. But don't fret. I think at the end of the day, difficult as it might be, at the end of the day, the Israeli army will go back into fighting, and Israel must achieve its goal of eradicating Hamas.

Rami. Igro retired. General James Spidermarks. Thank you both for being with this very, very much.