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Israel released 200 Palestinian prisoners on Saturday in exchange for four soldiers who were hostage of Hamas. Dozens of prisoners fulfilled life imprisonment in Israeli prisons for attacks against Israelis.
The Israeli penitentiary service said in a statement that the prisoners had been released from the prison of Offer, near the city of Ramallah, in the busy West Bank, and from another installation near Beersheba, in southern Israel.
The Israelis see them as terrorists, while many Palestinians say they carried out a legitimate resistance to the Israeli government or see them as victims of decades of Israeli occupation.
Hundreds of Palestinians gathered in a municipal building in Ramallah to welcome the prisoners home, pushing to recover their loved ones when they went down from the Red Cross buses that transported them.
Some released prisoners, still wearing gray uniforms apparently emitted by Israeli prison authorities, were supported on the shoulders of the crowd he sang.
“We left our prison, but the price for our freedom is high,” Mohammad Arda, one of the released prisoners, told journalists, while family and friends crowded around them. “I am thinking of the families of the inmates we lost during the last year and a half.”
On Sunday, Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners, mostly women and minors, in exchange for three hostages. This time, Israeli authorities are releasing many people who were convicted of much more serious crimes, including the murder of Israeli civilians in militant attacks.
According to the Israeli government, Arda, an activist of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, had been sentenced to life imprisonment for attempted murder and placement of an explosive artifact, among other crimes. He was one of the six prisoners who escaped briefly from an Israeli prison in 2021, surprising Israelis and Palestinians, before being captured.
More than 1,500 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel will be released as part of the first stage of the high the fire and hostage release agreement. Hamas has pledged to free 33 hostages; According to Israeli authorities, 97 people were arrested in Gaza when the agreement entered into force last Sunday.
Around 120 of the Palestinian prisoners released on Saturday they fulfilled life imprisonment for participating in attacks against Israelis, according to lists provided by the prisoners’ office linked to Hamas. According to the terms of the agreement, around 70 will be expelled from the territory controlled by Israel to areas controlled by Hamas in the Gaza Strip or abroad, to countries like Egypt.
Among those released on Saturday are Mohammad Odeh, Wael Qassim and Wissam Abbasi, which were arrested in 2002 by a series of mortal attacks against Israelis in populated civil areas. The three fulfilled life imprisonment for their participation in the attacks.
One of the most infamous attacks in the group, which took place at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, killed nine people, including five Americans.
The three men are scheduled to exile abroad and will never be allowed to return to their homes in Jerusalem, according to the terms of the agreement.
