Israel to free up to 1,904 Palestinians in 1st stage of hostage deal, including killers
Figures comprises 737 jailed Palestinians, 1,167 Gazans detained in ground op; notorious terrorist Zakaria Zubeidi, others responsible for the murder of dozens, to be freed

Israel is set to release up to 1,904 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, including several serving multiple life sentences for deadly terror attacks and murder, in return for 33 Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip during the first, 42-day phase of its deal with Hamas, according to a government decision made early Saturday morning.
The government approved the hostage and ceasefire deal after an eight-hour full cabinet meeting.
Among the Palestinians to go free are 737 jailed detainees and security prisoners, some of whom are serving life sentences for murder.
They include members of Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Palestinian Authority’s ruling Fatah movement, along with women and children being held in Israeli jails. Some prisoners were released in 2011 in return for captive soldier Gilad Shalit later and re-arrested.
The Justice Ministry had, as of Saturday morning, published the names of 735 Palestinian prisoners to allow petitions against their release to be submitted to the High Court.
Israel will also be releasing 1,167 Palestinians detained in the Gaza Strip during the IDF’s ground offensive, who did not participate in the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, invasion and massacre in southern Israel.

The numbers could fluctuate depending on how many of the 33 hostages are alive. Hamas has not yet provided the information, although Israel believes that most of them are.
On Sunday, the first three female hostages from the 33 humanitarian cases — a category made up of women, children, elderly individuals, and the infirm — are set to be released.
The other 30 hostages on the list are to be released each Saturday until the end of the deal’s 42-day first phase — four on January 25, and then three each week until a final group of 14.
The hostages will be released in exchange for a number of Palestinian prisoners detailed in the terms of the deal.

For each of the living women, children and elderly, 30 Palestinian prisoners will be released; for all nine sick hostages, 110 prisoners will be released; for each of the female IDF soldiers, 50 prisoners will be released; for hostages Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed, who have been held in Gaza for a decade, 30 prisoners will be released for each, in addition to 47 Palestinians released in the 2011 Shalit deal and re-arrested; and for the bodies of hostages in the first stage, Israel will release the 1,000+ Gazan detainees.
Beyond the 33 on the list, 65 more people are held by Hamas, many of them no longer alive. These are to be returned as part of a second phase of a deal, if it comes to pass, that would also see a permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
The Justice Ministry said the prisoners will not be released before 4 p.m. on Sunday — roughly when the first hostages are expected back in Israel, some seven-and-a-half hours after the ceasefire comes into effect.
The Israel Prison Service said it was taking measures to prevent any “public displays of joy” when Palestinian prisoners are released as part of the ceasefire deal.
Terrorists and murderers
Among the prisoners set to be released is notorious Fatah terrorist Zakaria Zubeidi, the former Jenin commander of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades. Zubeidi was detained in 2019 for his part in shootings near Beit El in the West Bank. He is thought to have been involved in numerous terror attacks, including a bombing that killed six people at the Beit Shean branch of the Likud party in 2002, at the height of the 2000-2005 Second Intifada.
In September 2021, he and five Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists broke out of the Gilboa Prison in northern Israel. They were re-apprehended days later.

Iyad Jradat, one of five PIJ terrorists charged with aiding the breakout from Gilboa Prison, is also set to be released under the ceasefire agreement. He is serving a life sentence for sending the perpetrators of the 2003 terror attack in Gadish, where they killed security coordinator Eli Biton.
Ahmed Dahiri, a senior PIJ official convicted of the murder, is also up for release. So, too, is Mahmoud Atallah, who is serving a life sentence for killing a Palestinian woman he suspected of cooperating with Israel. Atallah was indicted in September for raping a female prison guard at Gilboa Prison, where ex-officers are accused of having “pimped” female colleagues to security prisoners.
The list of prisoners to be released also includes Mohammed Abu Warda, who is serving 48 life sentences for masterminding multiple terror attacks, including a 1996 bombing on a bus in Jerusalem that killed 45 people.
Three prisoners from the so-called Silwan Squadron are also on the list. The Hamas terror cell, named for its members’ East Jerusalem neighborhood, carried out five bombings across Israel between March and June 2002, killing 35 people and wounding hundreds.
Of the squadron members, Israel is set to release Wael Qissam, Wissam Abbasi and Muhammad Odeh. The fourth member, Alaa Abbasi, is not up for release. At 60 life sentences, he is serving the longest prison term in the terror cell.
Nor will Israel release Marwan Barghouti, a former commander of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades whom Israel detained during the 2002 Operation Defensive Shield in the West Bank.
Barghouti, who was convicted in 2004 of involvement in the murders of five people during the Second Intifada, has expressed support for the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Opinion polls show him to be one of the most popular figures in Palestinian politics.

Israel is set to release his aide, Ahmed Barghouti. The latter Barghouti, who was also detained during Operation Defensive Shield, served at the time as a senior military official in Fatah. He was sentenced to 13 life sentences in Israel for involvement in terror attacks in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem that killed six people, including a police officer.
Israel will also release Hamas-linked journalist Bushra Tawil, 32. Tawil, a Ramallah native who is the daughter of West Bank-based Hamas official Jamal Tawil, has been in administrative detention in Israel since March 2023.

The controversial measure allows Israel to hold suspects for months on end without charge and is typically used when authorities have intelligence tying a suspect to a crime but not enough evidence for charges to stand up in a court of law.
Also to be freed is Khalida Jarrar, a Palestinian Authority lawmaker from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a Marxist faction designated as a terror group by Israel, the United States and the European Union for its numerous terror attacks and plane hijackings.
Jarrar was accused of masterminding the 2019 bombing that killed 17-year-old Rina Shnerb at a spring in the West Bank. As part of a plea deal, Jarrar was charged with “illegal association” and sentenced to two years in prison in 2021.
She has been re-arrested and held in administrative detention as part of an incarceration campaign that followed the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack, when thousands of terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza.

It is believed that 94 of the hostages abducted during the Hamas onslaught remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas released 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November, 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 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 bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.
Agencies contributed to this report.