As part of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, 4 female soldiers were released from Gaza
Palestinian militant group Hamas handed over four female Israeli military hostages to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Saturday.
The four were led to a platform in Gaza City amid a gathering of Palestinians and surrounded by dozens of armed Hamas members. The women waved and smiled before leaving and got into the ICRC cars that transported them to the Israeli soldiers.
The Israeli army said it had received four of them in Gaza. 200 Palestinian prisoners were freed as part of a cease-fire agreement to end the 15-month war in Gaza.
The four soldiers – Karina Ariyev, Daniela Gilboa, Naama Levy and Leary Albagh – were all stationed at an observation post on the edge of Gaza and were abducted by Hamas fighters who raided their base on October 7, 2023, during an Israeli attack.
A video of their abduction was released in May and shows the five pajama-clad military personnel, shocked and bloodied, tied up in a jeep. The footage was obtained from body cameras worn by gunmen who attacked the Nahal Oz station in southern Israel while the women were acting as interrogators.
The Israeli Ministry of Health announced that the hostages, who were freed after being reunited with their families at an Israeli army base near the Gaza border, will be taken to a hospital in central Israel.
Hamas said 200 prisoners would be released on Saturday as part of the exchange. Members of Islamic Jihad, Hamas and the Palestine Liberation Front (PFLP), some of which include life imprisonment.
About 70 will be deported, Hamas said. A Palestinian official close to the negotiations told Reuters that some of the released prisoners would be released to Egypt. Some will stay in Egypt, while others may go to Algeria, Qatar or Turkey.
Saturday’s exchange will be the second since a ceasefire began last Sunday and Hamas handed over three Israeli civilians in exchange for 90 Palestinian prisoners.
Emily Damari, 28, Doron Steinbrecher, 31, and Romy Gonen, 24, are the first three Israeli hostages to be released from Gaza. Gonen was kidnapped from the Nova Music Festival, and the others were kidnapped from Kibbutz Kfar Aza.
A months-long ceasefire brokered by Qatar and Egypt and supported by the United States ended the war for the first time in November 2023 after just one week of negotiations.
Israel said Hamas did not follow the withdrawal plan
After Saturday’s release, Israeli military spokesman Avichai Adrae said in a post on X that Hamas had not honored the ceasefire agreement to release Israeli civilians first. Israel was expecting the release of Arbel Yehud, one of the civilians taken hostage on Saturday.
Israel will not allow Palestinians to cross into northern Gaza until Judah is freed, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Israeli military spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said: “We are determined to return Israeli citizen Arbel Ehud, who was abducted from Nir Oz (kibbutz), as well as Shiri Bibas and her two children, Kfir and Ariel.
In the first six-week deal, Hamas agreed to release 33 hostages — including children, women, the elderly, and the sick and injured — and hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, but the Israeli military backed away from some of them. Their place in the Gaza Strip.
In the next phase, the two sides will negotiate an exchange of remaining hostages, including Gaza, which the Israeli army has dismantled after 15 months of war and Israeli bombardment.
Israel launched its operation on October 7, when Hamas militants killed 1,200 people and took more than 250 hostages back to Gaza. Since then, more than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to health officials there.
Following the release of hostages Romy Gonen, Emilie Damari and Doron Steinbrecher last Sunday and the return of the body of an Israeli soldier who had been missing for a decade, Israel said 94 Israelis and foreigners remain in Gaza, although it is not known how many are still alive.