Militant group Hamas released Thursday two Israeli women, with further Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners expected to be freed under an extended truce that has paused weeks of deadly fighting.
With the current truce set to expire early Friday, international bodies have called for a lasting halt to the war, sparked by deadly Hamas attacks on Israel that prompted it to mount a devastating assault on the Gaza Strip.
The delicate truce held through its seventh day after a 24-hour extension, marred by a shooting claimed by Hamas militants that killed three people in Jerusalem.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken met with Israeli and Palestinian leaders as Washington and foreign mediators seek a longer pause that would allow further prisoner-hostage exchanges and more aid into Hamas-ruled Gaza.
After Thursday’s release of two women facilitated by the Red Cross, the Israeli military said more hostages were expected to be transferred “in the next few hours”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office named the two as French-Israeli dual national Mia Shem, 21, and Amit Soussana, 40.
A video shared on social media showed Shem’s mother Keren crying with joy and hugging relatives after receiving the news of her daughter’s release on the phone, saying: “She’s coming home.”
She had called on world leaders to help free her “baby” in a press conference on October 17, days after the Hamas attacks.
Israel is due to release more Palestinian prisoners in turn, after the sides agreed to extend the pause in combat operations until Friday morning.
Only hours after the latest truce extension, Islamist militant group Hamas claimed responsibility for a shooting in Jerusalem that killed three people and called for an “escalation of the resistance”.
The two gunmen, who police said hailed from annexed east Jerusalem, were shot dead at the scene, a bus stop in the western part of the city.
Separately, two Israeli soldiers were slightly injured in a ramming attack on a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, the army said, adding the assailant had also been “shot and neutralised”.
– ‘Protect Gaza civilians’ –
United Nations chief Antonio Guterres and other international figures have called for more time to allow medical supplies, food and fuel into Gaza after fierce combat and bombardments sparked by Hamas’s bloody October 7 attacks on Israel.
“We have seen over the last week the very positive development of hostages coming home, being reunited with their families,” Blinken said at a meeting with Israeli President Isaac Herzog in Tel Aviv.
“It’s also enabled an increase in humanitarian assistance to go to innocent civilians in Gaza who need it desperately. So this process is producing results. It’s important, and we hope that it can continue.”
Blinken later told Netanyahu it was “imperative” to protect civilians in southern Gaza “before any military operations there”.
The latest extended truce had been due to end at 0500 GMT Thursday, but the Israeli army said the “operational pause” would continue as international mediators negotiate the release of hostages held by Hamas.
Israel has vowed to continue with its offensive to destroy Hamas once the truce process has run its course.
“We swore… to eliminate Hamas, and nothing will stop us,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video released by his office, after meeting with Blinken.
Fighting began on October 7 when Hamas militants broke through Gaza’s militarised border into Israel, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping about 240, according to Israeli authorities.
In response, Israel vowed to eliminate Hamas and unleashed an air and ground military campaign that the Hamas government says has killed more than 15,000 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians.
– Diplomatic push –
Herzog, in the United Arab Emirates for a UN climate summit, appealed on Thursday to his Emirati counterpart, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, to help “free the Israeli hostages held captive by the murderous terrorist organisation Hamas”, a statement from his office said.
In a separate statement on X, formerly Twitter, Herzog said he would hold “a series of diplomatic meetings” in Dubai to push for the hostages’ release.
The truce agreement, mediated by Qatar with Egypt and the United States, allows for extensions if Hamas can continue to release 10 hostages per day, but both sides have warned they are ready to return to fighting.
Since the truce began on Friday 72 Israeli hostages have been freed and 210 Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails under the terms of the deal.
At least 24 foreigners, most of them Thais living in Israel, have been freed outside the scope of the agreement.
Before the truce Israeli ground and air forces had pounded Gaza, forcing an estimated 1.7 million people — around 80 percent of the Hamas-run territory’s population — to leave their homes and limiting the entry of food, water, medicine and fuel, according to the UN.
– ‘Afraid bombings start again’ –
Conditions in Gaza remain “catastrophic” and the population faces a “high risk of famine”, the World Food Programme has said.
“We are afraid that the truce will end, so the problems and the bombings will start again,” Gaza City resident Mohamad Naasan told AFPTV on Thursday.
“I hope that the truce resumes… so peace prevails, and we all go back home.”
The violence in Gaza has also raised tensions in the West Bank, where nearly 240 Palestinians have been killed by either Israeli soldiers or settlers since October 7, according to the Ramallah-based Palestinian health ministry.
International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Karim Khan visited Israel on Thursday at the invitation of survivors and families of the victims of Hamas’s attacks, the court said on Thursday, adding that the visit was “not investigative in nature”.
Khan is also due to travel to Ramallah where he will meet with senior Palestinian officials, the ICC said.
The ICC is an independent world court set up to probe genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
burs-rlp/ami – Adel Zaanoun with Sebastien Berger in Jerusalem
