The Palestinian militant group Hamas handed over on Saturday four Israeli soldiers as hostage of the Red Cross International Committee (ICRC).
The four were taken to the Poda in the city of Gaza in the middle of the great crowd of Palestinians and surrounded by dozens of armed Hamas members. The women waved and smiled before they were taken, entering the ICRC vehicles that transported them to Israeli forces.
The Israeli army said the four had received a gauze. They were released in exchange for 200 Palestinian prisoners under the termination of fire interruption with the aim of ending the 15-month war in Gaza.
Four soldiers – Karina Ariev, Daniel Gilbo, Naama Levy and Liri Albag – all were stationed at the observation post on the edge of Gaza and were abducted by the Hamas fighters who overcame their base during the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
The recording of their abduction was aired in May and shows five military taxpayers, dressed in pajamas and dazed, and some bloody, as binding and putting them in the jeep. The footage was found from the camera on the body worn by armed attackers who attacked the Nahal Oz base in southern Israel where women served as observers.
After reuniting with his family in the Israeli military base near the border with Gaza, the liberated hostages will be taken to a hospital in central Israel, the Israeli Ministry of Health said.
Hamas said 200 prisoners would be released on Saturday as part of an exchange. Among them are members of the Islamic jihad, Hamas and the National Front for Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), some of whom serve life sentences.
About 70 will be deported, Hamas said. The Palestinian official close to the negotiations told Reuters that some of the liberated prisoners would be released to Egypt. Some of them will remain in Egypt, while others may go to Algeria, Qatar or Turkey.
Saturday’s exchange would be the second since the truce began last Sunday and Hamas handed over three Israeli civilians in exchange for 90 Palestinian prisoners.
Emily Damari (28), Doron Steinbher (31) and Roma Gonen (24) are the first three Israeli hostages released from Gaza on Sunday. Gonen is abducted from the Nova Music Festival, while the others abducted Kibuca Kfar Aza.
The fire interruption agreement, concluded after several months of negotiations with the mediation of Qatar and Egypt and with the support of the United States, stopped the fighting for the first time since the trial, which lasted only a week in November 2023.
Hamas does not follow the liberation plan, says Israel
After Saturday’s liberation, the spokesman of the Israeli army of Avichay Adraee said in a post on X that Hamas did not adhere to the fire interruption agreement to release the Israeli civilians first. On Saturday, Israel expected the release of Arbel Yehoud, one of the civilians held as hostages.
Israel will not allow Palestinians to move to the northern Gaza belt until Yehoud is released, said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In the first six -week phase of the agreement, Hamas agreed to release 33 hostages, including children, women, older men and sick and injured, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons, while Israeli troops are withdrawing from some of their positions in the gaza belt.
In the next phase, two sides would negotiate the exchange of remaining hostages, including military -capable men, and withdrawing Israeli forces from Gaza, which mainly lies in ruins after 15 months of fighting and Israeli bombing.
Israel launched its campaign in Gaza after Hamas on October 7, when the militants killed 1200 people and took more than 250 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli data. Since then, more than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to the health authorities there.
After releasing the hostages Roma Gonen, Emily Damari and Doron Steinbherer last Sunday and drawing the body of an Israeli soldier who has disappeared for a decade, Israel says that 94 Israelis and foreigners are still detained in Gaza, although it is not clear how much they are still alive.
