Israel will on Friday release 39 Palestinian prisoners, among them 24 women and 15 teenage males, in the West Bank in exchange for 13 hostages due to be freed from the Gaza Strip by Hamas, a Palestinian official said.The inmates, all of them from the West Bank or Jerusalem, will be handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross at Israel's Ofer military jail around 4 p.m., said Qadura Fares, Palestinian commissioner for prisoners.
That would coincide with the planned handover at the Gaza-Egypt border of 13 women and children who were among some 240 people taken hostage by Hamas terrorists during a deadly Oct. 7 rampage in southern Israel.
"After the Red Cross receives the (Palestinian) prisoners, the ones from Jerusalem will go to Jerusalem and the ones from the West Bank will gather in Betunia municipal council where their families will be waiting,” Fares told Reuters.
The prisoner release was part of an Israeli-Hamas ceasefire that began at 7 a.m. and appeared to be holding shakily with no major reports of bombings, artillery strikes or rocket attacks, although both sides were accused of violations.