Hamas releases four women Israeli soldiers in ceasefire swap
Four Israeli women soldiers taken hostage in the October 7 Hamas terror attacks have been freed in Gaza City under the second prisoner swap of the January ceasefire. They waved and smiled at times. Israel called it ‘a cynical ceremony’ | WATCH
Dozens of masked, armed Hamas and other militants gathered in a Gaza City square have handed over four Israeli women hostages the Red Cross over in return for Palestinian prisoners.
The Hamas-led fighters, carrying assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers had gathered in rows on Saturday, many carrying their groups’ banners and wearing headbands, as crowds of Gaza residents gathered around them to watch.
The four smiling Israeli soldiers were dressed in military fatigues.
The militant group freed Karina Ariev, Daniella Gilboa, Naama Levy and Liri Albag.
Ms Albag on Saturday expressed her gratitude to Israelis for their support for the families of captives seized by Hamas in October 2023, in released military footage.
“I love you, all the citizens of the State of Israel, who supported our families and embraced them, and all the IDF (Israeli military) soldiers who did everything for us. Thank you very much, I love you all,” Ms Albag is seen saying in the video after being freed along with three other captives earlier on Saturday.
A loud cheer swept through the crowd gathered at a Tel Aviv plaza known as Hostage Square, as giant screens livestreamed the long-awaited release of four Israeli hostages, the latest to be freed under a Gaza ceasefire deal.
Hundreds had arrived at the square early Saturday in anticipation of the four women soldiers’ release. Many wore yellow T-shirts with the words “You are not alone” printed on them in Hebrew.
After 15 months in captivity, many Israelis could begin to breathe a sigh of relief as the ceasefire and hostage exchange deal, which also sees Palestinian prisoners released, got under way last Sunday.
For hours, hundreds of pairs of eyes had been fixed anxiously at the screen on Saturday, awaiting the arrival of an International Committee of the Red Cross convoy at a square in the centre of Gaza City.
As soon as the four young women’s silhouettes appeared on the screen, cries of joy erupted, with many embracing one another tearfully in celebration.
Militants seized 251 hostages during Hamas’s October 7 attack which triggered the war, 87 of whom remain in Gaza, including 34 the military has confirmed are dead.
The first, six-week phase of the ceasefire that came into effect on Sunday should see the staggered release of 33 Israeli hostages in exchange for around 1900 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
“Bring them home now!” a group of women shouted in the crowd in Tel Aviv, echoing the slogan of the Hostage and Missing Families Forum campaign group.
Crowds of Palestinians also erupted in joy as they welcomed dozens of swapped Palestinian prisoners freed by Israel who arrived aboard buses in Ramallah, a AFP journalist reported.
Stepping off the bus in grey tracksuits, many prisoners were raised onto the shoulders of people waiting, while others walked through the crowd.
Seventy of the Palestinian prisoners arrived aboard buses in Egypt on Saturday, state-linked Egyptian media reported.
The Israeli Defence Forces said the Red Cross had notified the military that the hostages had been freed and the Red Cross brought the hostages to IDF and Shin Bet forces inside the Gaza Strip.
“The four returning hostages are currently being accompanied by IDF (military) special forces and ISA (Shin Bet security agency) forces on their return to Israeli territory, where they will undergo an initial medical assessment,” the military said..
The four “have arrived at the initial reception point in southern Israel where they are being reuinted with their parents”, the military said in a later statement, adding they were acompanied by army medics and would undergo “an initial medical assessment”.
Israel’s prison service confirmed on Saturday that it had released 200 Palestinian prisoners as part of a Gaza ceasefire deal, which earlier saw Hamas militants free the four Israeli hostages.
“After the conclusion of the necessary activities in the prisons and the approval of political authorities, all the terrorists were released from the Ofer and Ktziot prisons,” the statement said, adding that a total of 200 prisoners had been freed
Among them is a Palestinian inmate who has spent the longest continuous period in Israeli detention, Mohammed al-Tous, who was jailed for nearly four decades, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Club advocacy group, AFP reported. Aged 69 and in prison since 1985, Tous is a member of Fatah, the movement founded by late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Buses carrying Palestinian prisoners freed as part of the Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal departed from two Israel prisons on Saturday, AFP journalists reported later. The buses left Ofer prison in the occupied West Bank and Ktziot prison in the Negev desert.
But Israeli officials said Hamas had not stuck to its promise to release free civilians first and said its forces would not withdraw from northern Gaza until the civilian woman Arbel Yehud is released.
Ms Yehud could be one of the last surviving female hostages, with Israel having “grave concerns” about the fate of Shiri Bibas and her two babies, Ariel and Kfir.
“Hamas did not abide by its obligation in the deal to free civilian women first,” IDF spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said.
Hamas sources have told Al Jazeera that Ms Yehud is alive and will be released next Saturday. Hamas claimed Ms Yehud was trained in the Israeli occupation army’s space program, and was therefore not a civilian. Hamas is demanding more prisoners to be released for Ms Yehud’s release because of this military status.
IDF calls latest release of hostages a ‘cynical ceremony’
Europe Correspondent Jacquelin Magnay reports: Israel has criticised Hamas for today’s “cynical ceremony” having four Israeli female hostages dressed in their army uniforms and smiling and waving in front of Hamas flags.
Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said: “Hamas is a murderous terror group. In the last few hours Hamas proved its cruelty by organising a cynical ceremony.’’
The four soldiers released were pictured with commemorative paper bags containing photographic “mementos” of their time in captivity, smiling and waving to the crowd of Hamas fighters before being handed over to the International Red Cross.
The handover was in contrast to the chaotic handover of last week’s three women surrounded by shouting gunmen.
The women’s seeming happiness during their release was also at odds with their violent capture.
On October 7, 2023 Ms Levy, 20, was shown injured, with her blood stained pants and hands tied behind her back, pushed into a vehicle as she pleaded with her captors for mercy: “I have friends in Palestine”.
Today Ms Levy’s family said:”We are overjoyed and moved to see Naama standing strong and returning to us. Our hearts are with the Berger and Yehoud families who are still waiting for their loved ones. We will not rest until the last hostage returns.”
Agam Berger, another woman soldier, and women civilian Arbel Yehud are still being held hostage by Hamas and another Palestinian militant group.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum said the return of the four women after 477 agonising days in captivity “represents a moment of light in the darkness, a moment of hope and triumph of spirit, while serving as a painful reminder of the urgency to bring back the 90 hostages still in Gaza”.
The group added: “ We will not stop fighting until all phases of this deal are completed and every last hostage returns home to their loved ones. We extend our deepest gratitude to President Trump, whose instrumental efforts made this deal possible.”
Two women still being held, possibly for next weekend
The Wall Street Journal reports: Hamas earlier released the names of the next four Israeli hostages to be freed under the Gaza cease-fire deal, as mediators hope to build momentum that could lead to a lasting end to the war.
The multiphase deal’s protocols call for female hostages—civilians and soldiers—to be released first, followed by elderly and wounded men and then the bodies of the dead.
Only a few hostages meet the criteria for the first releases. The announcement of the four names means that two other women—29-year-old civilian Arbel Yehoud and another soldier, Agam Berger—will likely remain captives until the next round of hostage releases scheduled for next weekend.
Ariev, Gilboa, Levy, Albag and Berger were all taken from a military base near Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas launched attacks that sparked the war in the Gaza Strip.
The two sides negotiated the first phase of the cease-fire under the expectation that Hamas would first release female civilians and then female soldiers. Which hostages are released and when is hugely sensitive in Israel, where some families of captives are unsure whether their loved ones are alive or dead.
Israel had expected Yehoud to be among those freed this Saturday, a person familiar with the deal had said. Whether Israel will take issue with the delayed release of Yehoud wasn’t immediately clear.
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it had received the list of hostages to be released Saturday and would respond later.
Hamas complicated expectations about Saturday’s exchange earlier this week when it said it would free four female soldiers this weekend. That raised concerns in Israel about Yehoud and highlighted a multitude of possible disagreements that could hold up a precariously balanced deal.
On Thursday, a Hamas official had suggested Yehoud might not make Saturday’s list, saying four female hostages would be released and whether they were civilians or soldiers was subject to “field conditions as deemed appropriate” by the group.
Yehoud was taken from a kibbutz on the edge of Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023. Israel believes that she was held at least for some time by Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Hamas ally. The female soldiers are now all either 19 or 20 years old and were taken from their army base while conducting mandatory military service.
The list of 33 to be released in the first phase also includes the names of one other female civilian, Shiri Bibas, and her two children, Ariel and Kfir, who were 4 years and 9 months, respectively, when taken. Hamas said in November that they were killed in an Israeli bombing. The Israeli military said it investigated the Hamas claim but hasn’t confirmed their deaths.
As part of the deal, Israel has said it would release 50 Palestinian prisoners for each female soldier, including some jailed for life sentences, meaning 200 Palestinians are likely to be freed Saturday.
The militant group released three female civilians last Sunday in exchange for 90 Palestinian prisoners. Hamas is expected to provide an update Saturday on the status of the remaining hostages. After this weekend, hostages will be freed in groups over another five weeks.
“While we are filled with joy for the four hostages scheduled to be released,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, an advocacy group that represents hostages’ families, said Thursday, “we simultaneously face the terrifying possibility of learning that some of our loved ones might not be alive.”
The hostages have suffered through a war in Gaza that has proved one of the deadliest in modern Middle Eastern history, reducing much of Gaza to ruins and killing more than 47,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health authorities, who don’t say how many were combatants. The Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel that sparked the war left 1,200 people dead and 250 taken hostage.
As of Friday, Israel says 91 hostages taken in the Oct. 7 attacks remain in Gaza, most of them Israeli. They include more than 30 who Israel has concluded are no longer alive, though Israeli and US. officials privately believe the number of dead is much higher. Three additional hostages, taken before the Hamas-led attacks, bring the total to 94.
The U.S., Qatar and Egypt mediated the multiphase cease-fire deal, which came into effect Sunday and could lead to a permanent end to the fighting in the besieged enclave if all the phases are completed.
But even small details such as the sequencing of releases risk derailing it. The last cease-fire between the two sides in November 2023 in part collapsed over the issue, as Israel refused to continue the truce when Hamas offered to turn over male civilians and dead bodies before releasing female civilians Israel believed were still alive. Some of the elderly men whom Hamas had offered to release later died during the fighting in Gaza.
Adding to the coming weekend’s complexity, Gaza civilians are expected to begin moving back toward their homes in northern Gaza under the terms of the deal, with screening an important factor. Netanyahu had repeatedly pledged to stop Hamas militants from regrouping by moving through the strip.
Technical teams from mediating countries are working in Cairo on a mechanism for screening people for weapons as they travel through Gaza, Arab mediators said. Two American security contractors and one Egyptian intelligence-affiliated security company have been appointed to inspect people for weapons as they move around the enclave, the mediators said.
The technical teams are also debating a mechanism to reopen the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt on the Palestinian side, which would allow for more aid to flow into the enclave and people, especially the injured, to leave.
The process “is so fragile,” said Mairav Zonszein, a senior Israel analyst for the International Crisis Group. But, she said, there was a “huge sigh of relief on the Israeli side that hostages are going to return” in the first phase of the ceasefire. And for that reason, “Israel is not going to derail it five days in,” she said.
Israel and Hamas have agreed to negotiate toward a permanent end to the fighting and the release of more hostages in a second phase, talks that will again be mediated by the U.S., Qatar and Egypt.
Some members of Mr Netanyahu’s far-right coalition have criticized the current truce and are urging the leader to return to fighting Hamas in Gaza after the first phase. So far, however, Mr Netanyahu appears committed to the first phase of the cease-fire after facing pressure from the Trump administration to see it through.
With The Wall Street Journal
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