A second group of 200 Palestinian prisoners were released on Saturday under a Gaza ceasefire agreement and prisoner exchange between Hamas and Israel.
Television footage showed the arrival of 114 prisoners in the West Bank city of Ramallah from the Ofer military prison in three buses belonging to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
The freed prisoners were welcomed by thousands of Palestinians who had gathered in Ramallah to celebrate their release, an Anadolu Agency reporter reported.
Sixteen prisoners, accompanied by Red Cross representatives, also arrived at the European Hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, where they were welcomed by thousands of people.
Egyptian state-run Al-Qahera News also reported that two buses carrying 70 freed Palestinian prisoners had arrived in Egypt under the Gaza ceasefire agreement.
The prisoners’ media office said early Saturday that those released included 121 prisoners serving life sentences and 79 serving long sentences.
It added that 70 of those serving life sentences would be sent outside the Palestinian territories.
According to the statement, the prisoners released included 137 from the Palestinian group Hamas, 26 from Fatah, 29 from Islamic Jihad, three from the Palestinian Liberation Front and one from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, in addition to four individuals with no party affiliation.
The list includes Mohammed al-Tous, the Palestinian prisoner who has spent the longest time in Israeli prisons.
Tous, from the West Bank city of Bethlehem, was arrested in 1985 and sentenced to life in prison on charges of carrying out attacks on Israeli targets.
The second group of Palestinian prisoners set out from the Israeli prison Ketziot in the Negev desert in southern Israel.
Three-phase deal
Under the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire, Israel is now preparing to withdraw from the Netzarim Corridor area that separates northern Gaza from the south, allowing displaced Palestinians to return to the northern Gaza Strip.
The first six-week phase of the Gaza ceasefire agreement has come into effect, halting Israel’s war that has killed more than 47,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and wounded more than 111,000 since October 7, 2023.
On the first day of the ceasefire, Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for three Israeli prisoners released by Hamas.
The three-phase ceasefire agreement includes a prisoner exchange and a sustainable peace, with the goal of a permanent ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
The Israeli attacks have left more than 11,000 people missing, with widespread destruction and a humanitarian crisis claiming the lives of countless elderly people, women and children.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants in November last year for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide charge before the International Court of Justice over its war on the enclave, AA writes.
