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31-01-2025
JERUSALEM/ GAZA: Israel has delayed the release of more than 100 Palestinian prisoners, after hostages were released in chaotic scenes in Gaza
Seven hostages two Israelis and five Thais were released in Khan Younis earlier, as hundreds of people swarmed round the Red Cross convoy
One of the Israeli hostages, Arbel Yehud, was seen being led through the crowds by masked gunmen Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said they were “shocking scenes”
Hamas now says the release of the Palestinian prisoners will begin at 17:00 local time that’s 15:00 GMT
An eighth hostage, Agam Berger, was released separately in Jabalia earlier
We’ve been speaking to a journalist in Gaza who was covering the chaotic hostage handover in Khan Younis earlier.
The release happened near the destroyed house of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza last year.
“There was a lot of chaos, there was a lot of pushing,” the journalist says. He says people were chanting for Hamas’s al-Qassam brigades and for Sinwar.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the “shocking scenes”.
“This is additional proof of the inconceivable brutality of the Hamas terrorist organisation,” he said before he delayed the release of Palestinian prisoners.
At the municipal centre in Ramallah, among the many families awaiting the release and return of their loved ones from Israeli jails were sisters Raghad Hussain and Hedaya Hussain.
“I’m so tired with being disappointed,” said 21-year-old Raghad.
“This is the second time I’ve prepared myself and got dressed especially for my father’s release.”
Last week, she was told to get ready only to find out her dad wasn’t, after all, among the first wave of prisoners to be released under the fragile ceasefire agreement.
The two sisters, who look like twins, were dressed in traditional Palestinian clothing from the Nablus area of the occupied West Bank, where the family still lives although as they waited here in Ramallah they learned the family home had reportedly been raided by Israeli settlers who live nearby.
Raghad wasn’t even born when her father, Hussain Nassar, was detained and jailed in 2003. He’s now 47 years old.
“You don’t know what it’s like to live for so long without your dad,” she told me.
“I’ve never touched him before as my mum was pregnant with me when he was taken. This is the first time I will know what it’s like to have a father.”
Their father was detained, they said, for being an active fighter during the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising but the sisters, like other family members are patient.
As few hours’ delay won’t matter, they say as long as it happens sometime today.
We’ve just had this picture from the Thai embassy in Tel Aviv of the released Thai hostages, earlier named as Pongsak Thaenna, Sathian Suwannakham, Watchara Sriaoun, Bannawat Seathao, and Surasak Lamnao.
As we’ve reported, Israel has delayed the release of more than 100 prisoners, after the chaotic hostage release earlier.
The Hamas-run Prisoners’ Media Office says it will now happen at 17:00 local time that’s 15:00 GMT.
Earlier, Netanyahu’s office said the delay would be in place “until the safe exit of our hostages is guaranteed”.
The sister-in-law of released hostage Pongsak Thaenna says she “always had hope” that he would be reunited with his family.
“I told Pongsak’s father that it’s been a long time, but we’ll definitely get to see him, alive or not,” says Yaowares Sangkanueng. (Int’l News Desk)
