Israel delays Palestinian prisoner release after six Gaza hostages freed

Israeli authorities delayed the release of Palestinian prisoners due Saturday in exchange for six hostages freed from Gaza, prompting Hamas to accuse Israel of a "blatant violation" of the truce deal.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who in a statement after the six captives were released vowed to "continue acting decisively in order to bring all of our hostages back home", was due to convene a consultation on Saturday evening, two Israeli officials said.

"Once the security consultation concludes, a decision will be made regarding the next steps" of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas, said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, families were waiting for hours for their loved ones to be released from Israeli custody in exchange for the six Israelis taken back home.

"Waiting is very difficult," said Shireen al-Hamamreh, whose brother was due for release.

"We are patient and we will remain stronger than the occupier, God willing," she told AFP in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

The Palestinian Prisoners' Club advocacy group said Israel would free 620 inmates on Saturday, most of them Gazans taken into custody during the war, but their release has stalled into the night.

Hamas spokesman Abdel Latif al-Qanou said in a statement that Israel's "failure to comply with the release... at the agreed-upon time constitutes a blatant violation of the agreement" that has largely halted more than 15 months of devastating fighting in the Gaza Strip.

Qanou called on the truce mediators to pressure Israel to "implement its provisions without delay or obstruction".

The Israeli sources did not provide a clear reason for the delay, which comes after an emotional two days in Israel, where the remains of hostage Shiri Bibas have been identified after the initial handover of a different body.

Netanyahu has said Hamas will pay "the full price" for what he termed a violation of the truce deal over Bibas's return.

Bibas and her two young sons, among dozens taken captive during Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war, had become symbols of the ordeal suffered by the Israeli hostages.

Read moreIsraelis in shock after confusion around release of hostage Shiri Bibas' body

'Coming back home'

Six Israelis, some of them dual nationals, were released earlier on Saturday, the last group of living hostages under the truce's first phase.

The first phase of the truce has so far enabled the release of 30 captives and is due to expire in early March.

At a ceremony in Nuseirat, central Gaza, Eliya Cohen, 27, Omer Shem Tov, 22, and Israeli-Argentine Omer Wenkert, 23, waved while holding release certificates, flanked on a stage by masked Hamas militants before their handover to the Red Cross and return to Israeli soil.

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"I saw the look on his face, he's calm, he knows he's coming back home... He's a real hero," said Wenkert's friend Rory Grosz.

Under the cold winter rain in Rafah, southern Gaza, militants handed over Tal Shoham, 40, and Avera Mengistu, 38, who both appeared dazed.

A sixth hostage, Hisham al-Sayed, 37, was later released in private and taken back to Israeli territory, the military said.

Sayed, a Bedouin Muslim, and Mengistu, an Ethiopian Jew, had been held in Gaza for about a decade after they entered the territory individually.

Sayed's family called it "a long-awaited moment".

Relatives of Shoham wept and embraced as they watched his handover, video released by the Israeli government showed.

"Tal seems well considering the circumstances. An enormous weight is lifted from us," the family of the Austrian-Israeli dual national said.

Hamas later published a video showing two Israelis still held captive in Gaza watching one of Saturday's ceremonies from a vehicle, pleading for Netanyahu to secure their release. AFP could not confirm the authenticity of the video.

'Mix-up'

On Thursday, the first transfer of dead hostages under the truce sparked anger in Israel after analysis concluded that Shiri Bibas's remains were not among the four bodies returned.

The family said in a statement she "was murdered in captivity and has now returned home... to rest."

Israel's military said that, after an analysis of the remains, Palestinian militants killed the Bibas boys, Ariel and Kfir, "with their bare hands" in November 2023.

Hamas has long maintained that an Israeli air strike killed them and their mother early in the war, and on Saturday dismissed the military's account as "baseless lies".

Out of 251 people taken hostage during the October 2023 attack, 62 are still in Gaza including 35 the Israeli military says are dead.

The Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of 1,215 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel's retaliatory campaign has killed at least 48,319 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory that the United Nations considers reliable.

(AFP)