{"id":219730,"date":"2025-01-20T12:14:35","date_gmt":"2025-01-20T12:14:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/20\/palestinian-prisoners-released-as-gaza-cease-fire-takes-hold-israel-hamas-war-live-updates\/"},"modified":"2025-01-20T12:14:36","modified_gmt":"2025-01-20T12:14:36","slug":"palestinian-prisoners-released-as-gaza-cease-fire-takes-hold-israel-hamas-war-live-updates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/20\/palestinian-prisoners-released-as-gaza-cease-fire-takes-hold-israel-hamas-war-live-updates\/","title":{"rendered":"Palestinian Prisoners Released as Gaza Cease-Fire Takes Hold: Israel-Hamas War Live Updates"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Palestinian<\/div>


\n<\/p>\n

Three hostages have been freed in the first phase of the cease-fire agreement between Hamas and Israel.<\/p>\n

The hostages, all women, were released into Red Cross custody in Gaza on Sunday and were transferred to Israeli forces, who took them to meet their mothers, the Israeli military said.<\/p>\n

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About 100 hostages, living and dead, are thought still to be held in Gaza, most of them taken in the deadly Hamas-led attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Thirty-three of them will be released during an initial six-week phase of the cease-fire, including female soldiers and civilians, children, men over 50 and sick and wounded people, according to the agreement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe vast majority\u201d of the 33 hostages to be released in the six-week first phase of the cease-fire are alive, an Israeli military spokesman, Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, said Sunday in a discussion on social media.<\/p>\n

Video released by the Israeli military showed<\/a> the three hostages being reunited with their families at Sheba Hospital in Israel.<\/p>\n

In one clip, one of the returned hostages, Romi Gonen, is surrounded in an embrace by members of her family as they tearfully comfort one another. Yarden Gonen, her sister, who had traveled around the world in the past year to lobby for Romi\u2019s release, jumps up and down in the video as the family hugs. In another clip, another released hostage, Doron Steinbrecher, tearfully embraces loved ones.<\/p>\n

Romi Gonen<\/h2>\n

Ms. Gonen was 23 when she was captured as she was trying to leave the Nova music festival<\/a> in southern Israel when Hamas attacked. She was speaking at the time to her mother, Meirav Gonen, who said she had been shot and was bleeding.<\/p>\n

Last February, Meirav Gonen released a recording of her last phone call<\/a> with her daughter. She told the Israeli news media that Romi was a strong and happy person who often went to raves.<\/p>\n

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Romi Gonen was captured as she was trying to leave the Nova festival in southern Israel.<\/span>Credit…<\/span>Michael Reynolds\/EPA, via Shutterstock<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

In the early weeks of the war, her mother expressed concern<\/a> that Israeli military operations in Gaza could endanger the hostages. <\/p>\n

Romi Gonen\u2019s older sister, Yarden, told The New York Times<\/a> in February that she regularly went to a plaza in Tel Aviv where families of hostages have held vigils.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of us is doing anything remotely related to our previous lives,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Emily Damari<\/h2>\n

Ms. Damari, 27 at the time she was captured, is the only hostage with British citizenship who was still being held this month. She was taken from her home in Kibbutz Kfar Azza<\/a> in southern Israel and was seen by a neighbor in her own car,<\/a> driven by a militant, heading toward Gaza.<\/p>\n

Ms. Damari was raised in Israel but traveled to Britain often, according to her mother, British-born Mandy Damari, who was in Israel last month to speak with officials and the news media and to plead for a hostage and cease-fire deal. She said that her daughter had been shot and that she feared for her life, telling the BBC<\/a> that she had welcomed the threats from President-elect Donald J. Trump that there would be \u201call hell to pay\u201d if no deal was reached by his inauguration.<\/p>\n

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The entrance to Emily Damari\u2019s house in Kibbutz Kfar Aza in 2023.<\/span>Credit…<\/span>Avishag Shaar-Yashuv for The New York Times<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Last January, a hostage who had been released from Gaza, Dafna Elyakim<\/a>, told the Israeli news media that she and her younger sister had been taken into Hamas\u2019s underground tunnels, where they met other female hostages, including Ms. Damari.<\/p>\n

On the eve of the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks, Mandy Damari spoke at an event in Hyde Park<\/a> in London, where she described her daughter as a soccer fan who enjoyed a drink and had \u201cthe classic British sense of humor, with a dash of Israeli chutzpah thrown in for good measure.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Sunday, Mandy Damari thanked \u201ceveryone who never stopped fighting for Emily throughout this horrendous ordeal.\u201d But, she said in a statement, \u201cfor too many other families the impossible wait continues.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Israeli military also released a picture of Emily Damari and her mother that showed her missing two fingers on her left hand. Ms. Damari was shot in the hand on Oct. 7, 2023.<\/p>\n

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A picture released by the Israeli Army on Sunday shows Emily Damari at an undisclosed location.<\/span>Credit…<\/span>The Israeli Army<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Doron Steinbrecher<\/h2>\n

Ms. Steinbrecher, who was 30 when she was captured from her home in Kibbutz Kfar Azza, is a veterinary nurse with Romanian and Israeli citizenship. According to Israeli news media<\/a>, she was in touch with her family on the kibbutz when the militants attacked, telling her parents that they had smashed her windows and shot into her room.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve arrived, they have me,\u201d she said in a subsequent voice message sent to friends.<\/p>\n

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A supporter holding a poster of Doron Steinbrecher during a protest last week in Tel Aviv.<\/span>Credit…<\/span>Itai Ron\/Reuters<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Last January, Hamas released a video clip of Ms. Steinbrecher and two other captives, Daniella Gilboa and Karina Ariev, in which they pleaded for their release.<\/p>\n

Last March, on her 31st birthday, the Jewish News Syndicate<\/a> published an interview with her mother, Simona Steinbrecher, who said that she had looked pale and thin in the video. She said she was concerned that Ms. Steinbrecher was not getting the daily medication she needed, though she did not specify what that was.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s a strong woman, but it\u2019s terrible being there,\u201d Simona Steinbrecher said. <\/p>\n

On Sunday, the family of Doron Steinbrecher issued a statement celebrating her release that thanked the Israeli people and expressed gratitude to Mr. Trump \u201cfor his significant involvement and support, which meant so much to us.\u201d The statement did not mention President Biden or any Israeli leaders.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Three hostages have been freed in the first phase of the cease-fire agreement between Hamas and Israel. The hostages, all women, were released into Red Cross custody in Gaza on Sunday and were transferred to Israeli forces, who took them to meet their mothers, the Israeli military said. About 100 hostages, living and dead, are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":219731,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2025\/01\/20\/multimedia\/20mideast-crisis-promo-launch-jfwk\/20mideast-crisis-promo-launch-jfwk-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[4757,7275,43,32652,5552,2948,38,3246,1767,4758,19637,40164,3125,1074,2134,3102],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219730"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":219732,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219730\/revisions\/219732"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/219731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}