Israel released 200 Palestinian prisoners on Saturday in exchange for four soldiers who were being held hostage by Hamas. Dozens of the prisoners had been serving life sentences in Israeli jails for attacks against Israelis.
The Israeli prison service said in a statement that the prisoners had been released from Ofer Prison near the city of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank and from another facility near Beersheba in southern Israel.
Israelis view them as terrorists, while many Palestinians say that they conducted legitimate resistance to Israeli rule or view them as victims of Israel’s decades-long occupation.
Hundreds of Palestinians gathered at a Ramallah municipal building to welcome the prisoners home, pushing to get hold of their loved ones as they stepped out of the Red Cross buses that were transporting them.
Some freed prisoners, still wearing gray uniforms apparently issued by the Israeli prison authority, were held on the shoulders of the chanting crowd.
“We leave our jail but the price is high for our freedom,” Mohammad Arda, one of the freed prisoners, told reporters, as family and friends huddled around him. “I’m thinking about the families of the inmates we lost during the past year and a half.”
On Sunday, Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners, mostly women and minors, in exchange for three female hostages. This time, the Israeli authorities are freeing many people who were convicted of much heavier offenses, including the murder of Israeli civilians in militant attacks.
According to the Israeli government, Mr. Arda — an activist in Palestinian Islamic Jihad — had been sentenced to life for attempted murder and planting an explosive device, among other offenses. He was one of six prisoners who briefly escaped from an Israeli prison in 2021, stunning Israelis and Palestinians, before he was caught.
More than 1,500 Palestinians jailed by Israel are due to be released as part of the first stage of the cease-fire and hostage-release agreement. Hamas has pledged to release 33 hostages; 97 were held in Gaza when the deal went into effect last Sunday, according to the Israeli authorities.
About 120 of the Palestinian prisoners released on Saturday were serving life sentences for involvement in attacks against Israelis, according to lists provided by the Hamas-linked prisoners’ office. Under the terms of the agreement, about 70 will be expelled from Israeli-held territory to Hamas-controlled areas of the Gaza Strip or abroad to countries like Egypt.
Those being released on Saturday included Mohammad Odeh, Wael Qassim and Wissam Abbasi, who were arrested in 2002 for a string of deadly bombings targeting Israelis in crowded civilian areas. All three were serving life sentences for their involvement in the attacks.
One of the group’s most infamous attacks — which took place at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem — killed nine people, including five Americans.
The three men are all slated to be exiled abroad and will never be allowed to return to their homes in Jerusalem, according to the terms of the agreement.