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Israel Frees 200 Palestinian Prisoners in Second Cease-Fire Exchange


Israel launched 200 Palestinian prisoners on Saturday in change for 4 troopers who have been being held hostage by Hamas. Dozens of the prisoners had been serving life sentences in Israeli jails for assaults towards Israelis.

The Israeli jail service mentioned in a press release that the prisoners had been launched from Ofer Prison close to the town of Ramallah within the occupied West Bank and from one other facility close to Beersheba in southern Israel.

Israelis view them as terrorists, whereas many Palestinians say that they carried out respectable resistance to Israeli rule or view them as victims of Israel’s decades-long occupation.

Hundreds of Palestinians gathered at a Ramallah municipal constructing to welcome the prisoners residence, pushing to pay money for their family members as they stepped out of the Red Cross buses that have been transporting them.

Some freed prisoners, nonetheless sporting grey uniforms apparently issued by the Israeli jail authority, have been held on the shoulders of the chanting crowd.

“We go away our jail however the worth is excessive for our freedom,” Mohammad Arda, one of many freed prisoners, informed reporters, as household and buddies huddled round him. “I’m excited about the households of the inmates we misplaced through the previous 12 months and a half.”

On Sunday, Israel launched 90 Palestinian prisoners, principally ladies and minors, in change for 3 feminine hostages. This time, the Israeli authorities are liberating many individuals who have been convicted of a lot heavier offenses, together with the homicide of Israeli civilians in militant assaults.

According to the Israeli authorities, Mr. Arda — an activist in Palestinian Islamic Jihad — had been sentenced to life for tried homicide and planting an explosive system, amongst different offenses. He was one in every of six prisoners who briefly escaped from an Israeli jail in 2021, beautiful Israelis and Palestinians, earlier than he was caught.

More than 1,500 Palestinians jailed by Israel are attributable to be launched as a part of the primary stage of the cease-fire and hostage-release settlement. Hamas has pledged to launch 33 hostages; 97 have been held in Gaza when the deal went into impact final Sunday, in accordance with the Israeli authorities.

About 120 of the Palestinian prisoners launched on Saturday have been serving life sentences for involvement in assaults towards Israelis, in accordance with lists supplied by the Hamas-linked prisoners’ workplace. Under the phrases of the settlement, about 70 might be expelled from Israeli-held territory to Hamas-controlled areas of the Gaza Strip or overseas to international locations like Egypt.

Those being launched on Saturday included Mohammad Odeh, Wael Qassim and Wissam Abbasi, who have been arrested in 2002 for a string of lethal bombings concentrating on Israelis in crowded civilian areas. All three have been serving life sentences for his or her involvement within the assaults.

One of the group’s most notorious assaults — which came about on the Hebrew University of Jerusalem — killed 9 individuals, together with 5 Americans.

The three males are all slated to be exiled overseas and can by no means be allowed to return to their properties in Jerusalem, in accordance with the phrases of the settlement.

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Written by EGN NEWS DESK

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