Four Israeli soldiers, kidnapped by Hamas during the attacks on 7 October 2023, were freed by the militiamen who control Gaza following the release of 200 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli prisons. The second exchange of prisoners foreseen by the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas was thus concluded. Twenty-year-olds Karina Ariev, Daniella Gilboa and Naama Levy and nineteen-year-old Liri Albag are in good health and were able to hug their families again after 477 days of captivity. And, while the citizens of the Jewish state celebrate the return home of the four young women in the streets, the Israeli government accuses Hamas of having violated the agreement, which first provided for the release of all civilian women hostages still alive.
In particular, Tel Aviv complains about the failure to deliver Arbel Yehud, who had been taken away from the Nahal Oz kibbutz together with her boyfriend Ariel Cunio (also still a hostage) and should have been part of today’s exchange. Faced with the violation, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) warned that they will not respect the clause of the agreement that called for the withdrawal from the northern half of the Netzarim corridor on the seventh day of the ceasefire. Palestinians will therefore not be allowed to return to the northern Gaza Strip via the coastal road until Yehud is returned. Hamas sources have assured that the woman is alive and in good health and will be released on February 1, as part of the third prisoner exchange. Elements of the Islamic Jihad, in whose hands Yehud is, claimed that the woman had undergone training with the Israeli Space Force and was therefore considered to be a soldier.
Daniel Hagari, IDF spokesman, called on Hamas to respect the agreements and branded it as the media display put in place by Hamas was a “cynical ceremony”. for the liberation of the female soldiers. If on the previous Saturday the crowd had risked overwhelming the trucks carrying the first three freed Israelis, this time everything was managed to perfection, with a real show designed to pierce screens around the world and generate indelible snapshots. While the security forces maintained strict public order and the Israeli broadcasters showed the Red Cross vehicles crossing the Kerem Shalom crossing, the cameras of the video reporters and dozens of mobile phones, whose videos were uploaded in real time to Telegram, filmed columns of armed men in uniform and balaclavas congregating in Palestine Square aboard motorcycles and vans, brandishing grenade launchers and automatic rifles, some of which were stolen from the IDF.
First the Ezzedin al Qassam brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, then the Al Quds brigades, the Islamic Jihad fighters, filled the square, in the center of which a table was placed, adorned with Palestinian flags, at which the representatives of the Cross Red sat down to sign the necessary documents. The dark choreography continued with the arrival in the square of five white SUVs without license plates from which the four girls in uniform got out and, holding hands, climbed onto a stage, waving and smiling. Then they were taken over by the Red Cross, which he took them to an IDF position in the Strip where they underwent an initial rapid medical examination: they were all found to be in good condition. Then the transfer to Israeli territory, to the Re’im military base, where they found their parents waiting for them, before being admitted to hospital for more in-depth tests. In the meantime, trucks with the two hundred released Palestinians had left from the penitentiaries of Ofer, in the occupied West Bank, and Ktziot, in the Negev desert. Seventy of them have already been deported to Egypt: they had been convicted of killing Israeli citizens and, according to the terms of the agreement, they will not be able to return to Gaza.