Israel and Hamas have carried out a prisoner swap, the latest exchange under the deal to secure a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.
Hamas released three Israeli captives on Saturday morning, while Israel’s prison service confirmed it released 183 Palestinians, saying in a statement that they “were transferred from several prisons across the country” before being taken to the occupied West Bank, occupied East Jerusalem and Gaza.
The exchange is the fifth under the truce agreement, which took effect on January 19 but already appears increasingly fragile amid United States President Donald Trump’s proposal to forcibly displace Palestinians from the besieged enclave.
Hamas handed the Israeli captives over to the International Committee of the Red Cross at a carefully managed event on Saturday morning.
The three male civilians – Eli Sharabi, 52, Or Levy, 34, and Ohad Ben Ami, 56 – were released under the first phase of the truce, which runs until early March.
Ahead of the handover, they appeared on a stage set up in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, surrounded by Qassam Brigades fighters and holding up release certificates.
Banners on the stage read: “We are the flood, we are the war’s next day.”
Shortly after the release of the Israelis, television footage showed a bus leaving the Ofer Prison in the occupied West Bank. Dozens of released Palestinians disembarked shortly afterwards in the town of Ramallah to scenes of jubilation from the waiting crowd.
Seven Palestinians among those released were admitted to hospitals upon arriving in Ramallah, the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said.
Seven will be transferred to Egypt ahead of further deportation.
Among the Palestinians set for release were senior Hamas figures. Iyad Abu Shakhdam, 49, was jailed for nearly 21 years over his involvement in Hamas attacks on Israel in the Palestinian uprising of the early 2000s.
Jamal al-Tawil, a prominent Hamas politician in the occupied West Bank and former mayor of the village of el-Bireh, near Ramallah, spent nearly two decades in and out of Israeli detention, most recently without charge.