The Israeli military said eight hostages, including three Israelis and five Thai nationals, were released Thursday as Israel and Hamas carried out their third exchange of hostages and prisoners under a ceasefire agreement to halt more than 15 months of fighting in Gaza.
Israeli soldier Agam Berger was released to the Red Cross in the refugee camp of Jabaliya in northern Gaza, then went to Israel, where she was reunited with her parents.
“Thank God we have reached this moment, and our hero Agam has returned to us after 482 days in enemy hands,” Berger’s family said in a statement. “Now Agam and our family can begin the healing process, but the recovery will not be complete until all the hostages return home.”
Hours later, a Red Cross convoy moved through a chaotic, crowded scene in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis to deliver the other two Israelis and the Thai nationals to the Israeli military.
Their release was delayed after armed militants struggled to contain the large Palestinian crowds that gathered around the Red Cross cars. The hostages were eventually led through the crowd surrounded by a ring of gunmen.
“I view with utmost severity the shocking scenes during the release of our hostages,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement released by his office shortly after the handover was completed. He said he “demands that the mediators make certain that such terrible scenes do not recur and guarantee the safety of our hostages.”
The Israel Defense Forces confirmed the group then crossed into Israeli territory. It identified the freed Israelis as Arbel Yehoud and Gadi Moses, and the Thais as Thenna Pongsak, Sathian Suwannakhan, Sriaoun Watchara, Seathao Bannawat and Rumnao Surasak.
The military said the Israelis would be reunited with their families, while Thai government officials would meet with its citizens.
Later in the day, as part of the ceasefire agreement, Israel was set to release 110 Palestinian prisoners, including about 30 serving life sentences for deadly attacks on Israelis.
Under the ceasefire, more than 423,000 Palestinians have returned to northern Gaza over the past three days after the Israeli military ordered them out of the region in the earliest stages of the war in October 2023. However, their homecoming has been bittersweet as nearly everyone has friends or relatives who have been killed in the warfare, and many northern neighborhoods have been decimated in the fighting.
Previous exchanges have freed seven hostages the militants were holding in Gaza and 300 prisoners held by Israel.
Hamas is due to release three additional hostages on Saturday, with Israel freeing dozens more Palestinian prisoners.
The first phase of the ceasefire lasts for 42 days, about one-quarter of which has passed. It calls for the release of 33 hostages from Gaza, as well as negotiations on the details of the second phase involving the release of the rest of the hostages, an end to the conflict and the withdrawal of Israeli forces.
Those negotiations are due to begin next week.
U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to reinforce American support for the ceasefire.
Witkoff, who played a key role in shaping the six-week truce, also inspected the Netzarim Corridor, a 6-kilometer-wide strip of land that bisects Gaza, where American security contractors have been hired to help oversee the return of displaced Palestinians.
Witkoff was the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Gaza in years. American officials have stayed away from the narrow territory along the Mediterranean Sea because of security concerns and Washington’s no-contact policy with Hamas, a U.S.-designated terror group.
Netanyahu is headed to Washington this weekend. U.S. President Donald Trump has invited him for talks at the White House on Tuesday. It will be Trump’s first meeting with a foreign leader since starting his second term in office.
Meanwhile during the ceasefire in Gaza, Israel has ramped up its military operations in the occupied West Bank. Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a visit to the city of Jenin on Wednesday that Israel has “declared war on Palestinian terrorism in Judea and Samaria,” referring to the West Bank.
“The Jenin refugee camp will not return to what it was,” he said. “After the operation is completed, the [Israel Defense Forces] will remain in the camp to ensure that terrorism does not return.”
The war in Gaza started with the shock Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terror attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people and led to the capture of 250 hostages.
Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza has killed at least 47,400 people, most of them women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry. The Israeli military said the death toll includes 17,000 militants.
Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
