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Hamas launched three Israeli men in Gaza on Saturday before an expected exchange for Palestinian prisoners later in the day, when the fragile shooting was stopped in its third week.
Men were handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross at a ceremony that was elaborate in Deir Al -Bala, a relatively unsafe section of the Gaza Strip.
They were taken hostages from their homes and from a music festival during the Palestinian group’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, where about 1,200 people were killed, according to Israeli officials.
Ohda bin Ami, 56, or Levi, 34, and Elie Charraby, appeared 52 pale and slave, as Hamas on stage alongside its armed fighters.
Later on Saturday, Israel is required according to the conditions of a ceasefire to release about 180 Palestinian prisoners. The vast majority were held without trial in Israeli prisons. Less than twenty of them spent the provisions of life after being convicted of attacks on the Israelis.
During the 15 months of the Israel War in Gaza, nearly 48,000 people were killed in the besieged tape, according to local officials.
Despite the latest exchange, the ceasefire framework is increasingly pressure, due to the operating hiccups and public data made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who emphasized his hesitation in ending the war.
On Friday, Hamas was late to confirm that the swap will be held on the specified date – as required under the ceasefire agreement – after it complained that Israel did not allow tens of thousands of tents and mobile homes in Gaza.
A person familiar with the details said, although it is not clear when the delivery was supposed to reach.
The need for shelter has become increasingly urgent this week as winter storms criticized the coastal pocket. About 2 million people were displaced there and lived in the cities of the sprawling tents and the ruins of their neighborhoods.
The future of the ceasefire was also thrown by Netanyahu’s pledge earlier this week at the White House to resume the war with Hamas, after he was told that Donald Trump prefers to remove the entire Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip.
The ceasefire from three stages currently in two phases between the first and second phases is supposed to have negotiations to put an end to the war.
In the first six weeks, Hamas was asked to launch 33 Israeli hostages, including all children, women and men over the age of 50. By Saturday, 21 of them released. It ends six weeks in the first week of March.
The group originally took about 250 people hostage on October 7, 2023. It issued about 120 during the ceasefire in November 2023 compared to hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. It is believed that many of the remaining hostages have died.
Last week, Hamas released five workers on the Thai farm who were captured during the cross -border raid.
Hamas will only start the release of male soldiers who took the prisoner and delivered the bodies of dead hostages if negotiations succeed in converting the temporary ceasefire into a permanent truce. This will require Israel to withdraw its forces from Gaza.
These talks are scheduled to start this week, but Israel has not yet sent any high -level teams to Qatar or Egypt, which mediates the agreement alongside the United States.
If Netanyahu finished the war, he risks the collapse of his ruling right -wing alliance, which includes a far -right political party.
Their demands include continuous fighting and permanent reshaping of Gaza’s tape. This is in harmony with the Trump plan for the United States to control the pocket, expel its Palestinian population and start the reconstruction plan that would turn it into “Riviera in the Middle East.”
Hamas rejected these proposals, which were condemned by Arab and European allies in the United States.