By MOHAMMAD JAHJOUH, WAFAA SHURAFA and JOSEPH KRAUSS, Related Press
KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel started releasing 110 Palestinian prisoners on Thursday after eight hostages within the Gaza Strip had been freed by fighters earlier within the day in a typically chaotic course of that briefly referred to as the trade into query and underscored the fragility of a ceasefire that started this month.
The prisoners launched embrace 30 serving life sentences for lethal assaults in opposition to Israelis. Some are allowed to return to the occupied West Financial institution, whereas these convicted of extra severe crimes are being transferred to Egypt earlier than additional deportation.
Their releases started late Thursday after fighters in Gaza freed three Israelis and 5 Thai nationals, who had been engaged on farms in southern Israel when taken hostage greater than 15 months in the past.
The releases are a part of a ceasefire geared toward ending the deadliest and most damaging struggle ever fought between Israel and Hamas, and securing the discharge of dozens extra hostages kidnapped within the Hamas-led assault on Oct. 7, 2023, that ignited the struggle. Hamas has been designated as a terrorist group by the US, Canada and the European Union.
Scenes of chaos as hostages are launched
Scuffles erupted because the convoy of buses carrying the Palestinian prisoners departed from their Israeli jail within the West Financial institution. Palestinian youngsters threw stones outdoors the complicated and Israeli forces fired tear gasoline as they tried to clear the realm.
Three Palestinians had been wounded within the confrontations outdoors the jail, in accordance with Palestinian Crimson Crescent, which stated Israeli forces had used gunfire and stun grenades to disperse crowds.
The households of Palestinian prisoners caught their first glimpses of the Crimson Cross buses carrying their family members by the bus windshields, some shattered within the melee of stone-throwing and tear gas-firing.
The uproar got here hours after a chaotic hostage handover within the Gaza Strip, the place masked fighters shuttled some captives by a rowdy crowd of hundreds of Palestinians.
Hamas launched seven of the hostages in entrance of the destroyed residence of its slain chief, Yahya Sinwar, as hundreds pressed in. The group referred to as it a “message of willpower,” but it surely triggered the most recent in a sequence of disputes which have despatched U.S. and Arab mediators scrambling to patch up the truce.
The primary hostage — feminine soldier Agam Berger, 20 — was launched after Hamas paraded her in entrance of a smaller crowd within the closely destroyed city Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza.
Hours later, a chaotic scene unfolded at a handover of the opposite seven within the southern metropolis of Khan Younis. A whole bunch of fighters from Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad group arrived with a convoy, and hundreds of individuals gathered to observe, some from the tilted rooftops of bombed-out buildings.
Footage confirmed hostage Arbel Yehoud, 29, wanting surprised as masked fighters hustled her by the shouting crowd, pushing folks again. Additionally launched had been Gadi Moses, an 80-year-old Israeli man, and 5 Thai laborers. Each Yehoud and Moses are twin German-Israeli nationals.
Netanyahu condemned the “stunning scenes” and referred to as on worldwide mediators to make sure the security of hostages in future releases.
Israel recognized the Thai hostages launched as: Watchara Sriaoun, 33; Pongsak Thaenna, 36; Sathian Suwannakham, 35; Surasak Rumnao, 32; and Bannawat Saethao, 27. Thai officers stated they seemed to be in good well being.
Twenty-three Thais had been amongst greater than 100 hostages launched throughout a weeklong ceasefire in November 2023. Israel says three Thais stay in captivity, two of whom are believed to be lifeless.
Yehoud had been on the middle of a dispute earlier this week over the sequence through which the hostages can be launched. The US, Egypt and Qatar, which brokered the ceasefire after a yr of powerful negotiations, resolved it with an settlement that Yehoud can be launched with the others on Thursday.
About 20 pals of Yehoud gathered in southern Israel watched because the tense scene unfolded on stay tv. Some cried. Others had their arms over their eyes or mouths. The gang then burst into tears after she was turned over to the Crimson Cross.
The 80-year-old Gadi Moses seemed surprised as he was led by Israeli troopers to the realm the place he was set to reunite along with his household. Footage launched by the Israeli navy confirmed his family members bursting into the room, embracing the aged man. His daughter exclaimed repeatedly, “my father, my father!”
Ceasefire holds for now however subsequent part shall be tougher
Within the first part of the ceasefire, Hamas is ready to launch a complete of 33 Israeli hostages, together with girls, youngsters, older adults and sick or wounded males, in trade for almost 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. Israel says Hamas has confirmed that eight of the hostages to be launched on this part are lifeless.
A line of white buses carrying Palestinian prisoners set to be launched Thursday left Ofer jail within the West Financial institution and made their manner towards Beitunah, close to the occupied West Financial institution Metropolis of Ramallah the place family members and celebrations awaited.
Amongst these set to be launched from prisons Thursday is Zakaria Zubeidi, a distinguished former chief and theater director who took half in a dramatic jailbreak in 2021 earlier than being rearrested days later.
As well as, round 30 people who find themselves serving life sentences after being convicted of lethal assaults in opposition to Israelis are set to be freed.
Palestinians have cheered the discharge of the prisoners, who they extensively see as heroes who’ve sacrificed for the reason for ending Israel’s decadeslong occupation of lands they need for a future state.
Israeli forces have in the meantime pulled again from most of Gaza, permitting a whole bunch of hundreds of individuals to return to what stays of their properties and humanitarian teams to surge help.
The deal requires Israel and Hamas to barter a second part through which Hamas would launch the remaining hostages and the ceasefire would proceed indefinitely. The struggle may resume in early March if an settlement shouldn’t be reached.
Israel says it’s nonetheless dedicated to destroying Hamas, even after the group reasserted its rule over Gaza inside hours of the truce. A key far-right companion in Netanyahu’s coalition is already calling for the struggle to renew after the ceasefire’s first part.
Hamas says it gained’t launch the remaining hostages with out an finish to the struggle and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.
Tens of hundreds killed
Hamas began the struggle when it despatched hundreds of fighters storming into Israel. The terrorists killed some 1,200 folks, largely civilians, and kidnapped round 250.
Israel’s ensuing air and floor struggle was among the many deadliest and most damaging in many years. Greater than 47,000 Palestinians have been killed, over half of them girls and youngsters, in accordance with Gaza’s Well being Ministry, which doesn’t say how most of the lifeless had been fighters.
The Israeli navy says it killed over 17,000 fighters, with out offering proof, and that it went to nice lengths to attempt to spare civilians. It blames civilian deaths on Hamas as a result of its fighters function in dense residential neighborhoods and put navy infrastructure close to properties, faculties and mosques.
The Israeli offensive has remodeled complete neighborhoods into mounds of grey rubble, and it’s unclear how or when something shall be rebuilt. Round 90% of Gaza’s inhabitants has been displaced, usually a number of occasions, with a whole bunch of hundreds of individuals residing in squalid tent camps or shuttered faculties.
Shurafa reported from Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, and Krauss from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Related Press writers Sam Mednick in Tel Aviv, Israel, Isabel DeBre in Jerusalem, and Natalie Melzer in Nahariya, Israel, contributed.
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