The other two ministers from Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit party and another from Smotrich's Religious Zionism faction also voted against it, but Religious Zionism's Ofir Sofer, the immigration minister, is reported to have voted in favour.
Following the approval, Prime Minister Netanyahu said that Israel was "about to achieve" the return of the remaining hostages.
Speaking alongside US Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, President Trump's son-in-law who was heavily involved in peace talks, Netanyahu said: "We’ve fought during these two years to achieve our war aims.
"A central one of these war aims is to return the hostages, all of the hostages, the living and the dead. And we are about to achieve that goal."
The White House confirmed yesterday that the first hostages are expected to return by Monday.
It is understood that the 22 hostages believed to be alive will be freed first, while recovering the remains of the other 26 still in Gaza will take longer.
Israel's cabinet meets on October 10, 2025 to approve the peace deal signed with Hamas (Image: GPO)[Missing Credit]
Under Trump’s “comprehensive” Gaza peace plan, once the hostages have been returned, in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, the IDF will continue to withdraw to a “buffer zone”, where troops will remain until Hamas is disarmed.
Speaking to his own cabinet in Washington before departing to Israel, where he will address the Knesset on Monday, President Trump said: "Last night, we reached a momentous breakthrough in the Middle East.
"We ended the war in Gaza, and on a much bigger basis, created peace… hopefully an everlasting peace in the Middle East."
However, both Israel and Hamas have only signed up to the “first phase” of the 20-point plan, with issues such as Hamas' disarmament and demilitarisation, as well as the future governance of Gaza, still to be negotiated.
Trump added: "[Peace] is what people wanted more than anything else… After that, we’ll see.
"But [Hamas has] agreed to things, and I think it’s going to move along pretty well."
Senior White House officials also reportedly told a press briefing that up to 200 US troops could be deployed to Israel to support the peace process.
The forces, under the command of Admiral Brad Walker, will not enter Gaza but will “oversee, observe and make sure there are no violations or incursions”.
“Much of this is going to be oversight. Embedded within his team of 200 people will probably be a bunch of people from the Egyptian armed forces who will help, the Qatari armed forces who will help, as well as the Turks and probably the Emiratis,” one official added.
Elsewhere, Channel 12 reported that Germany is “expected” to lift its arms embargo on Israel in the wake of the ceasefire, following a conversation between Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar on Thursday.
Meanwhile, in potentially one of the last casualties of the war, the IDF has confirmed that a reservist was killed by a Hamas sniper shortly before the ceasefire came into effect.
Sergeant First Class (res) Michael Mordechai Nachmani was part of the Technology and Maintenance Corps in the 614th Combat Engineering Battalion.
The 26-year-old from Dimona was slain in a sniper attack after negotiators in Cairo had already reached a peace deal on Thursday morning.
However, the ceasefire did not come in until midday, meaning that the war was still active when he was killed.
