Israeli television has shown images of three hostages being handed over to the Red Cross as part of a ceasefire deal that pauses a 15-month-old war that has brought devastation and seismic political change to the Middle East.
The Israeli military said the hostages, held by Hamas militants since Oct. 7, 2023, then made their way in vehicles to the Israeli Defence Forces and Shin Bet security officials in Gaza, before being transported to southern Israel.
The Red Cross said the hostages are in good health. A large crowd gathered in a public square in Tel Aviv, Israel, to watch a screen showing scenes of the start of the transfer in Gaza City.
U.S. President Joe Biden, speaking in Charleston, S.C., on his last day in office, said “the guns in Gaza have gone silent” under the six-week ceasefire agreement he outlined in May, which aims to have a total of 33 hostages released in exchange for Palestinian imprisoned by Israel.
Israeli officials have said they don’t know whether all 33 of those hostages are alive.
Earlier Sunday, Hamas released the names of the first set of hostages to be freed, identifying them as Romi Gonen, Doron Steinbrecher and Emily Damari.
About 90 Palestinians from the West Bank and Jerusalem who have been held in Israeli prisons were to be released Sunday. They include 69 women.
One of the groups representing the families of hostages in Gaza, the Hostage and Missing Families Forum, said it welcomes news of that the three women would be released.
In a statement issued two hours after the ceasefire deadline, Hamas said it had sent the list of names, and Israeli officials confirmed receipt. Hamas named the hostages chosen for release as Romi Gonen, Doron Steinbrecher and Emily Damari.
Steinbrecher, 31, and Damari, a 28-year-old Israeli-British dual citizen, were taken from their homes in the Kfar Aza kibbutz in southern Israel. Gonen, 24, who’s from the town of Kfar Vradim in northern Israel, was kidnapped from the Nova music festival in the desert near the Gaza-Israel border.
From the left are photos of Emily Damari, Romi Gonen and Doron Steinbrecher, three women who were taken hostage by Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023. (Courtesy of Hostages Families Forum)
Guards could be seen on Sunday standing outside the Sheba Medical Center, where the women were expected to be assessed, in Ramat Gan, on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.
Fighting in the Gaza Strip halted on Sunday as the ceasefire agreement between Israel and the Palestinian militant group took effect after a brief delay. Residents and a medical worker in Gaza said they had heard no new fighting or military strikes since about half an hour before it was finally implemented.
Israeli airstrikes, artillery and tank attacks continued in northern Gaza after the initial deadline of 8 a.m. local time, Gaza-based paramedics said, killing at least 13 Palestinians and wounding dozens more before the ceasefire actually took effect about three hours later. Israel’s military said it had carried out air and artillery strikes against “terror targets.”
Israel blamed Hamas for the delay after the Palestinian militant group failed to provide a list naming the first three hostages by the deadline set as part of the agreement.
A Palestinian official, speaking on condition of anonymity, blamed the delay on ongoing Israeli air and ground bombardments, saying this made it physically difficult to send the list to mediators.
It’s hoped the highly anticipated 42-day ceasefire deal will pave the way for an end to the war, which has sparked a wave of fighting across the Middle East that largely pits Israel and its Western and U.S. allies against Iran and the paramilitary groups Tehran supports, including Hamas, Lebanese Hezbollah, the Houthis of Yemen and Iraqi militias.
Hamas, which controls the besieged coastal enclave of Gaza, sparked the war by attacking towns in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages. Most of those have since been released or killed.
A further 400 Israeli soldiers have been killed in combat in Gaza.
Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in retaliation against Hamas has killed nearly 47,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza-based health officials. Those include thousands of Hamas fighters and the group’s top military leaders, but the UN human rights office says the majority of deaths it has verified are women and children.
The assault has destroyed the territory’s infrastructure and made almost all its 2.3 million residents homeless.
Hostages for detainees
The Gaza ceasefire deal provides for the phased release of dozens of hostages Hamas still holds in Gaza in return for Israel’s release of hundreds of Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
For every hostage released, Israeli is supposed to release 30 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. The releases are part of the first stage of the deal, in which over six weeks 33 of the remaining 98 hostages in Gaza — women, children, men over 50, the ill and wounded — will be released in return for almost 2,000 Palestinian held in Israeli prisons.
The Palestinians being held include 737 men, women and teenagers, some of whom are members of militant groups convicted of attacks that killed dozens of Israelis, as well as hundreds of Palestinians from Gaza in detention since the start of the war.
SOURCE: THOMSON REUTERS
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