Israel starts freeing Palestinians as Hamas frees three captives

As Israel started releasing scores of Palestinians in the most recent phase of a truce agreement intended to conclude the 15-month conflict in Gaza, Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas handed up three Israeli prisoners on Saturday, whose thin look startled Israelis.

Or Levy was kidnapped from the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023, and gunmen brought him onto a Hamas podium. Ohad Ben Ami and Eli Sharabi were also taken captive from Kibbutz Be’eri during the cross-border raid launched by Hamas on that day.

Compared to the 18 hostages who had previously been released under the truce agreed upon last month, the three guys all looked emaciated, frail, and pale, and their conditions were worse.

“He looked like a skeleton, it was awful to see,” Michal Cohen, Ohad Ben Ami’s mother-in-law, told Channel 13 News during the handover ceremony, which was overseen by Hamas. The prisoners were asked questions by a guy in a mask as militants with automatic guns waited on each side.

Hamas, which has paraded warriors at past releases, displayed much more force when it turned over detainees to the International Committee of the Red Cross, deploying hundreds of its militants in downtown Gaza. They were then transported to Israeli soldiers in ICRC trucks.

Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, called the sight of the weak hostages “shocking” and promised to solve the situation.

The releasing ceremony was seen as opportunistic and cruel by Israeli President Isaac Herzog. “This is what a crime against humanity looks like,” he declared.

The three captives’ pictures, according to the Hostage Families Forum, brought back memories of Holocaust survivors of Nazi concentration camps. “We have to get ALL THE HOSTAGES out of hell,” it continued.

Residents of Palestine complain about mistreatment.

Israel is releasing the hostages in return for the release of 111 Palestinian inmates held in Gaza during the conflict and 183 Palestinian prisoners, some of whom were found guilty of taking part in assaults that killed dozens of people.

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, a bus carrying forty-two released Palestinian inmates was greeted by a joyful throng in Ramallah.

One of those released was Eyad Abu Shkaidem, who was given 18 life sentences in Israel for planning suicide strikes in retaliation for Israel’s 2004 killings of Hamas leaders.

When Shkaidem arrived in Ramallah, he told reporters, “Today, I am reborn,” amid applause from the audience.

Many of the released inmates seemed to be in terrible condition, and some of them reported being mistreated. “We were humiliated for more than a year by the occupation,” Shkaidem stated.

According to the Palestinian Red Crescent medical organization, six of the 42 inmates who were freed have been brought to hospitals.

Due to accusations of war crimes and crimes against humanity during the conflict, the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for both Israeli and Hamas commanders.

Human rights organizations have documented severe mistreatment of Palestinians in Israeli custody since the conflict in Gaza began. The Israeli military is looking into a number of reported abuse instances, but it denies claims of widespread mistreatment in its prisons.

HURRIBLE RETURN

The return of some captives will be unpleasant. In the Hamas attack on Kibbutz Be’eri, where one in ten inhabitants perished, Sharabi’s wife, who was born in Britain, and his two teenage children were killed. After losing his wife in the assault, Levy will be reunited with his three-year-old kid.

Thus far, the exchange has resulted in the release of 583 Palestinian prisoners and detainees and the return of 13 Israeli and five Thai hostages.

After going into force on January 19, the first 42-day phase of the truce, which was negotiated by Washington, Cairo, and Doha, has held up despite some setbacks.

Since U.S. President Donald Trump’s unexpected demand that Palestinians be evacuated from Gaza and that the region be turned into the “Riviera of the Middle East,” there have been growing concerns that the agreement may fall through before all the captives are released.

Trump’s plan has been condemned by Arab nations and Palestinian organizations, who claim it would amount to ethnic cleansing. Hamas said on Saturday that their armed protest during the captive exchange proved it could not be left out of the post-conflict plans for Gaza.

However, Netanyahu praised Trump’s participation, and his defense minister gave the military instructions to prepare to permit Palestinians who wanted to leave Gaza to do so.

The ceasefire agreement calls for the release of 33 Israeli women, children, and elderly, ill, and injured males in return for around 2,000 Palestinian detainees and inmates during the first phase.

The second round of negotiations, which aims to return the remaining hostages and agree to a complete withdrawal of Israeli soldiers from Gaza in preparation for a definitive conclusion to the war, started this week.

According to Israeli estimates, on October 7, 2023, Hamas-led terrorists assaulted Israel, killing almost 1,200 people and taking over 250 captives.

Israeli air and ground forces responded by attacking Gaza, destroying much of the territory and killing about 47,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials.