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LAST UPDATE | 23 Feb
HAMAS SAID ISRAEL has gravely endangered the five-week-old Gaza ceasefire by delaying the release of Palestinian prisoners under the deal because of the manner it has freed Israeli hostages.
The first phase of the truce ends early in March and details of a planned subsequent phase have not been agreed.
With tensions again hanging over the deal, Israel has announced an expansion of military operations in the occupied West Bank.
The military said a tank division will be sent in to the West Bank city of Jenin, the first such deployment to the territory in 20 years.
Defence Minister Israel Katz said he has told troops “to prepare for a prolonged presence in the cleared camps for the coming year and to prevent the return of residents and the resurgence of terrorism.”
Israel is using the ceasefire in Gaza as an opportunity to ramp up violent raids, destroy infrastructure and expel Palestinians in the West Bank, according to one Israeli NGO that spoke to The Journal, while residents of the targeted areas have described being driven from their family homes.
The United Nations reported on 13 February that over 40,000 Palestinians had been displaced by Israel’s ‘Operation Iron Wall’ in the space of 20 days.
Since the first phase of the ceasefire began on 19 January, Hamas has released 25 living Israeli hostages in ceremonies before crowds at various locations in Gaza.
Armed masked fighters escort the captives onto stages adorned with slogans. The hostages have spoken and waved in what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called “humiliating ceremonies”.
The Red Cross has previously appealed to “all parties” for the swaps to be carried out in a “dignified and private” manner.
In the seventh scheduled prisoner-hostage swap, Hamas released six Israeli captives on Saturday while Israel put off releasing Palestinian prisoners. Hamas has called the move a “blatant violation” of the truce deal.
Israel had been expected to release more than 600 Palestinian prisoners.
“In light of Hamas’ repeated violations – including the disgraceful ceremonies that dishonour our hostages and the cynical use of hostages for propaganda – it has been decided to delay the release of terrorists”, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
The delay will last “until the release of the next hostages is ensured, without the humiliating ceremonies”, it added.
From Washington, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned that Hamas would be “destroyed” if it did not release all remaining hostages.
In light of Hamas's repeated violations, including the ceremonies that humiliate our hostages and the cynical exploitation of our hostages for propaganda purposes >>
— Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) February 23, 2025
Senior Hamas official Bassem Naim said postponing the release exposes “the entire agreement to grave danger”.
Naim said the mediators, “especially the Americans”, must pressure Israel’s government “to implement the agreement as it is and immediately release our prisoners.”
Both sides have accused each other of violations during the ceasefire but it has so far held.
Families of the Palestinian prisoners, meanwhile, waited hours on Saturday for their loved ones to be released from Israeli custody, only to be disappointed.
“We wait for them, to hug them, and see them, but Netanyahu is always stalling,” said Fatiha Abu Abdullah, a mother in the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis.
“God willing, they will be released soon,” added Abdullah, whose son has been in an Israeli prison since November.
In the southern city of Khan Yunis, Umm Diya al-Agha, 80, said she had received word her son was among those scheduled to be freed, after 33 years in prison.
“If my heart were made of iron, it would have melted and shattered. Every day, I have been waiting for this moment”, she said.
The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club advocacy group had said Israel would free 620 Palestinians jailed in Israel on Saturday, most of them Gazans taken into custody during the war.
Before Netanyahu’s announcement, Hamas spokesperson Abdel Latif al-Qanou said Israel’s “failure to comply with the release… at the agreed-upon time constitutes a blatant violation of the agreement”.
Qanou called on the truce mediators to pressure Israel to “implement its provisions without delay or obstruction”.
The six Israelis released Saturday were the last group of living hostages set to be freed under the truce’s first phase.
The deal is due to expire in early March.
Negotiations for a second phase, which is meant to lead to a permanent end to the war that was triggered following Hamas’ 7 October 2023 attack on Israel, have yet to begin.
At a ceremony in Nuseirat, central Gaza, Eliya Cohen, 27, Omer Shem Tov, 22, and Israeli-Argentine Omer Wenkert, 23, waved from a stage, flanked by masked Hamas militants, before their handover to the Red Cross.
“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”.
Hamas said they freed Sayed in private to “honour and respect” Palestinians inside Israel.
A total of 251 people were 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 offensive 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.
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