Israel confirmed the list of the fourth batch of hostages to be released Tuesday and secondly that Hamas was holding onto three murdered IDF soldier’s bodies in Gaza.
By Joshua Marks, JNS
Israel has received from Hamas the list of 10 hostages to be released from Gaza on Tuesday, according to the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office. The list is part of a two-day ceasefire extension agreed to on Monday.
The list is being reviewed and families of the captives are being notified, the PMO said.
A total of 50 Israeli women and children, plus one Israeli man, have been freed since the initial four-day ceasefire started on Friday morning, along with 17 Thais and one Filipino.
Hamas has agreed to release 10 hostages per day as part of the extension, which could last up to six additional days before Israel’s military operation in Gaza résumé.
Israel agreed to release three jailed Palestinian terrorists for each Israeli hostage as part of the deal, which also includes the entry of humanitarian aid and fuel into the Strip.
The government on Monday evening approved a list of 50 female Palestinian terrorists who could potentially be released as part of the truce extension.
Approximately 175 Israelis and foreigners are still being held in Gaza, including Kfir Bibas, who was 9 months old when he was taken hostage by Hamas along with his parents and 4-year-old brother from Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7.
On that date, thousands of heavily armed Hamas terrorists broke across the Gaza border, rampaging across southern Israel. At the end of the hours-long assault, 1,200 people were murdered, more than 5,000 wounded and some 240 hostages were taken back to the Gaza Strip.
The Israel Defense Forces revealed on Tuesday that Hamas was also holding the bodies of three soldiers abducted on Oct. 7, naming them as Staff Sgt. Tomer Yaakov Ahimas, 20, from Lehavim; Sgt. Kiril Brodski, 19, from Ramat Gan; and Sgt. Shaked Dahan, 19, from Afula.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will visit Israel on Thursday for the fourth time since the start of the war, the U.S. State Department said on Monday.
He is scheduled to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other members of the War Cabinet to discuss a further extension of the ceasefire and ways to release more hostages. The current 48-hour extension expires on Thursday.
Blinken is also scheduled to visit Ramallah and then attend the COP28 U.N. climate conference in Dubai. He will arrive in the region after attending meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday in Brussels and Skopje, North Macedonia, where NATO foreign ministers and the Organization for Peace and Security in Europe will discuss the situation in Ukraine.