A group of 17 hostages were released from the Gaza Strip on Saturday and have arrived in Egypt, the Israel Defense Forces said.
Thirteen Israelis and four Thai nationals were freed as part of a breakthrough deal between Israel and Hamas to pause fighting. As part of the deal, 39 Palestinians were expected to be released.
“A short time ago, the representatives of the Red Cross transferred the abductees to Egypt,” the IDF said in a statement Saturday. “The convoy of the abductees returning to Israel is making its way through Egyptian territory to the meeting point in Kerem Shalom.”
The release followed an hourslong delay in the release earlier in the day. It comes one day after a batch of 24 hostages were freed.
On Friday, Doron Katz-Asher, 34, and her two young daughters, Raz, 4, and Aviv, 2, were among those named as being freed on a list released by the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Amelia Aloni, 6, and her mother Daniel, 45 were also on the list as well as Ohad Munder-Zichri, who spent his 9th birthday in captivity, his mother Keren, 54, and grandmother Ruth, 78.
Also on the list was Hanna Katzir, 76, who was previously thought to have been killed. She was abducted from her home in the Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7, when her husband, Rami, was killed.
Israel, in exchange, freed 39 Palestinians it had been holding for various alleged offenses.
The families of hostages have relentlessly demanded the release of their loved ones, holding a demonstration last month in front of the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv. Israel has said that around 240 hostages were taken when Hamas attacked the country on Oct. 7.
The temporary cease-fire deal, which began Friday and is set to last four days, was reached following an “extremely excruciating five-week process,” according to one official with U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration. An administration official said Biden was directly involved in the negotiations of the deal and received hourly updates on its progress. Biden thanked the leaders of Qatar, Egypt and Israel, who helped broker the deal, during a televised address from Nantucket, Massachusetts.
Under the deal, hundreds of trucks will be allowed to deliver aid to the region. It is expected that at least 50 hostages will be freed from Gaza and 150 Palestinians from Israel by the end of the four-day truce.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
