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The families of U.S. hostages held by Hamas touted President-elect Donald Trump’s role in the cease-fire negotiations with Israel, emphasizing the need for his leadership as families await the possible release of their loved ones. 

Jonathan Dekel-Chen, whose son Sagui was taken hostage, argued Trump’s “strength” is “desperately needed” to execute the deal during “Fox & Friends First” after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the Israeli Cabinet’s vote on the agreement would be delayed. 

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“The hostage families, but the people of Israel as a whole, desperately needed the strength and the insistence of President-elect Trump to get to sort of the brink last night, [with the] announcement of the hostage deal,” Dekel-Chen told Carley Shimkus on Thursday. “We need them even more now to really do what they must and to pressure all sides to bring this home, to get it done without political posturing for… domestic reasons and… without manufacturing reasons not to go through with it.”

“We are, as you said, very much in limbo and… extremely concerned that our government is not acting in good enough faith to make this happen and to put aside its narrow interests and political survival,” he continued. “We need our friends, those that are currently in the White House, and those that are going to be taking over the White House starting Monday.”

Netanyahu’s office said Thursday his Cabinet won’t meet to vote on the Gaza cease-fire deal until Hamas backs down from what it called a “last minute crisis.” Netanyahu’s office accused Hamas, without elaborating, of trying to go back on part of the agreement in an attempt “to extort last minute concessions.” 

Leading up to the announcement that both sides had reached a deal, Trump issued a chilling warning to Hamas on several occasions that there would be “hell to pay” if the hostages weren’t released before his inauguration. 

“It was a turning point,” Dekel-Chen said. “There’s no question. While it’s true, and President Biden talked about this last night, that the basic format of this plan has existed now since at least late May, but it had been stalled. The negotiations had been stalled for months… and it took that statement by President-elect Trump to rattle the cages of the intermediaries, Qatar and in Egypt and Israel, of course, mostly Hamas.”

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“In the joint effort between the incoming Trump officials and the outgoing and Biden officials, we’ve really seen what the U.S. can do at its greatest,” he continued. “So I was immediately appreciative and recognized the moment, and since then, President Trump has reinforced it, as well as some of his incoming senior officials.”

Despite many giving Trump credit for the deal, Biden balked at a question posed by Fox News senior White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich on Wednesday about whether he deserves credit for it. 

“Who in the history books gets credit for this, Mr. President, you or Trump?” Heinrich asked Biden at Wednesday afternoon’s White House news conference. 

“Is that a joke?” the president responded.

When Heinrich denied that her question was in jest, Biden responded, “Oh. Thank you,” and walked away.

Ruby Chen, whose son Itay Chen was taken hostage, credited former Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., for his role in advocating for the hostages’ release. He argued the Biden administration’s “rhetoric” has not met the mark during “Fox & Friends.”

“The language that has been coming out of the White House has been insufficient,” Chen told Brian Kilmeade on Thursday. “I think that is the type of rhetoric that we should have been hearing from the White House a long time ago. There have been 12 U.S. citizens that were taken hostage. Five of them came out.”

“I’d like to remind you of another fact, Brian… when we see those hats of 47… everyone thinks of President Trump, but… 47 also has another meaning for me. That is the number of U.S. citizens killed by Hamas,” he continued. “That is the largest single attack on U.S. citizens if you want to take out 9/11 until the 1980s, and I would like to ask the people of the United States, where’s the justice for those 47 people?”

Chen also thanked President-elect Trump for inviting the families of the hostages to his inauguration on Monday. 

Fox News’ Andrea Margolis and Bradford Betz contributed to this report.