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Israel gets list of Gaza hostages to be released tomorrow, Netanyahu office says.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Israel had received a list from Hamas of hostages to be released on Thursday as part of the Gaza ceasefire.
“Israel received the list of hostages who are supposed to be released from Hamas captivity tomorrow,” the prime minister’s office said on Wednesday, adding that further details would be given “after the families are updated.”
Netanyahu had announced on Sunday that three hostages would be released on Thursday, followed by another three on Saturday.
Two of the hostages set to be released on Thursday are Arbel Yehud and Agam Berger, while the identity of the third remains unknown.
Israeli authorities had demanded Yehud’s release during the second hostage-prisoner swap on Saturday in exchange for allowing hundreds of thousands of displaced Gazans to return to their homes in the north.
It was only after the militant group Islamic Jihad released video footage of Yehud speaking, and Hamas sources said she was “alive and in good health,” that Israel began allowing Gazans to return north on Monday.
In the one-minute video, Yehud appeared visibly distressed as she stated her identity and the date – January 25 – before calling on Netanyahu to do everything in his power to secure the release of the remaining hostages in Gaza.
Berger, a soldier, was captured while on duty on the Gaza border during Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack.