Four hostage bodies will be returned by Hamas Thursday in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners who were initially released last week.
Israel and Hamas claim to have reached an agreement to exchange the remains of four Israeli hostages who died against hundreds of Palestinian prisoners on Thursday, thus preserving a fragile ceasefire that seemed about to collapse.
Israel had delayed the release of 600 prisoners, initially scheduled for last weekendto protest against what he described as a cruel treatment of hostages during their release by Hamas.
The Islamist group qualified this postponement as “serious violation” of the truce, which is to enter its second phase this weekend.
But Hamas now affirms thatAn agreement was concluded to resolve the dispute, thus opening the way to the return of the four bodies of four other deceased hostages. In exchange, Israel will release hundreds of prisoners, as well as an indefinite number of women and children detained since Hamas attacks on October 7, 2023.
Prisoners will be released “At the same time as the bodies of Israeli prisoners that it had been agreed to put back”according to a press release from Hamas. The group confirmed that the exchange would take place on Thursday.
Previous exchanges were marked by what Israel, the United Nations and the Red Cross have qualified as ceremonies “humiliating” During which the Israeli hostages were exhibited by Hamas and forced to greet large crowds.
A new controversy broke out last week when Israeli medical-legal tests confirmed thatOne of the restored bodies, supposed to be the hostage Shiri Bibas, was in fact that of an unidentified woman.
This last agreement concludes the obligations of the two parties for the first phase of the ceasefire and opens the way to the second phase of the truce, which must include talks on the total Israel withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.
The ceasefire, negotiated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar, ended 15 months of fierce fighting after the attack on Hamas on October 7, during which the Islamist group killed some 1 200 people in Israel and took 250 hostage.
