Israel: Arbel Yehoud, Agam Berger, 3rd hostage to be freed Thursday; 3 more on Saturday
PM’s office also says Hamas has sent how many 1st-phase captives are alive, with tally matching Israeli intelligence; IDF to allow Gazans to return to Strip’s north Monday morning
Israel announced Sunday night that a dispute over the implementation of the ceasefire and hostage deal with Hamas in Gaza had been resolved, with the terror group set to release six hostages in two batches this week, including civilian woman Arbel Yehoud and soldier Agam Berger.
Jerusalem also said Hamas had finally sent a list detailing the conditions of the remaining hostages set to be released in the ongoing, 42-day first phase of the ceasefire, which began on January 19. Both the failure to send this list by Saturday and Hamas’s failure to free Yehoud before IDF servicewomen had been regarded by Israel as violations of the truce deal.
With those matters resolved, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the military would allow hundreds of thousands of displaced Gazans to return to the Strip’s north through the Netzarim Corridor starting Monday morning.
Netanyahu’s office said Israel had reached the agreement with Hamas after “strong and determined negotiations,” and reiterated that it would “not tolerate any violation of the agreement.”
The statement came shortly after Qatar’s foreign ministry released similar details. The United States welcomed the developments and praised the Israeli government.
According to the agreement, Yehoud, Berger and a third unnamed hostage will be released on Thursday. In addition, three more hostages will be freed on Saturday as scheduled.
NBC News previously reported that Keith Siegel, 65, a US native, would be released in the coming week, though there was no confirmation and it was unclear if this would happen on Thursday or Saturday.
In exchange for the hostages, Israel will free Palestinian security prisoners — 30 for each civilian, and 50 for Berger including 30 terrorists serving life sentences.
The fate of Yehoud had become a major sticking point in the deal’s implementation, with Israel blocking the return of Palestinians to northern Gaza after Hamas released four female soldiers on Saturday. Under the ceasefire and hostage release deal, the terror group had been required to prioritize the release of civilian women.
Yehoud is being held by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which had reportedly been falsely describing her as a soldier and demanding more prisoners be released in return for her. The Kan public broadcaster reported Sunday evening that PIJ had agreed to classify her as a civilian, helping to resolve the crisis.
Hamas said Sunday that it had given guarantees that Yehoud was alive and safe and would be released soon.
In another step that helped overcome the obstacles, the Prime Minister’s Office said late Sunday that it had received a document from Hamas regarding whether or not the remaining hostages slated for release in the first stage of the ceasefire deal were still alive.
Hebrew media outlets reported, citing unnamed senior Israeli officials, that the Hamas list only included an overall number of captives who are alive rather than a specification regarding each abductee.
However, the sources said the number checked out with the intelligence Israel has and didn’t contain “surprises.”
Reports have previously stated Israel believes 25 of the total of 33 hostages slated for release in the first phase are alive. With seven captives already released alive over the past week, this would mean that 18 of the remaining 26 hostages are alive while eight are dead.
Yehoud, 28, and her boyfriend Ariel Cunio, 26, were kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz on October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza.
Cunio’s older brother David is also in Hamas captivity. Neither is slated for release during the deal’s first phase, in which Hamas has committed to free 33 women, children, men over 50, and those considered especially unhealthy, in return for some 1,904 Palestinian security prisoners.
With the release Saturday of female soldiers Naama Levy, Karina Ariev, Daniella Gilboa and Liri Albag, three Israeli women remain in captivity in Gaza: soldier Agam Berger and civilians Yehoud and Shiri Silberman Bibas.
The civilian women were to be released alongside the two children still in captivity: Silberman Bibas’s sons Ariel, 5, and Kfir, 2. The Bibas’s relatives said Saturday that their “world came crashing down” when Hamas announced it would not be releasing Shiri, Ariel and Kfir over the weekend.
Yarden Bibas, Silberman Bibas’s husband and father of the boys, is included in the list of unhealthy men to be released toward the end of the agreement’s first phase. The IDF said of the Bibas family Saturday that Israel has “grave concerns for their fate.”
Gazans set to be allowed to return to north
The announcement of the imminent green light for the return of Gazans to the Strip’s north came after tens of thousands massed Sunday on a coastal road in central Gaza near the Netzarim Corridor, an IDF-held area separating northern Gaza from its south.
The IDF said it had fired warning shots at those who approached forces and “posed a threat.” In addition, the military said that in southern Gaza, troops eliminated a member of Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s rocket unit, after he “posed a threat.”
Under the ceasefire deal, the Israeli military was to allow Palestinians to return to northern Gaza along the al-Rashid road starting Saturday, and was to withdraw from part of the Netzarim Corridor, along that road, by Sunday.
However, Israel kept the passage closed, saying it would not allow Gazans to reach the north of the Strip until Hamas arranged for the release of Yehoud.
After that was overcome, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesperson tweeted that residents would be allowed to return northward on foot via the Netzarim Road and Rashid Street on the coast starting at 7 a.m. on Monday.
Vehicles would be allowed to pass through Salah a-Din Street in the east, after a security inspection, starting at 9 a.m., Avichay Adraee said.
Adraee also issued a series of warning to Gazans, including not to transport terror operatives or weapons to northern Gaza; not to approach IDF positions and troops in Gaza or Israeli territory; not to near the Rafah Crossing and Philadelphi Corridor area in southern Gaza; and not to swim, dive or fish in the Mediterranean Sea in the coming days.
#عاجل ???? إعلان عاجل الى سكان قطاع غزة بناء على الاتفاق الذي تم التوصل اليه برعاية الوسطاء حيث ستدخل التعليمات التالية حيز التنفيذ:
⭕️سيسمح بعودة السكان مشيًا على الأقدام الى شمال قطاع غزة عبر طريق نتساريم ومن خلال شارع الرشيد (طريق البحر) اعتبارًا من الساعة 07:00 صباحًا… pic.twitter.com/ICaqMzGGSk
— افيخاي ادرعي (@AvichayAdraee) January 26, 2025
US President Donald Trump’s Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff described the latest Israel-Hamas agreements as “wonderful,” shortly after they were announced.
“I talked to the president about it and he was thrilled about it,” Witkoff told reporters, hailing the role of Qatar and Israel in the talks.
“It’s a good day for the hostages,” he said.
Witkoff says he was moved to tears by this past Saturday’s release of four IDF soldiers from Hamas captivity, saying that him losing his own son had helped him identify with the families waiting to receive their daughters back.
“This week will be another moment like that. It felt solemn but very worthy,” he said.
President Trump's special envoy to the Middle east Steve Witkoff in New York addresses the resolved hostage crisis and the ceasefire in Lebanon. pic.twitter.com/vhcW2S8RWt
— Iris (@streetwize) January 26, 2025
Eighty-seven of the abducted by Hamas in the October 7 onslaught remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas has so far released seven hostages during a ceasefire that began this month. The terror group released 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November 2023, and four hostages were released before that.
Eight hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 40 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the Israeli military as they tried to escape their captors.
Hamas is also holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the body of an IDF soldier who was killed in 2014. The body of another IDF soldier, also killed in 2014, was recovered from Gaza this month.
Emanuel Fabian and agencies contributed to this report.
