BEITUNIA, West Bank (AP) — Palestinians celebrated on Monday as Israel began releasing nearly 2,000 Palestinians from prison in exchange for Hamas's freeing of Israeli hostages under a breakthrough ceasefire deal in Gaza.
Hundreds cheered as two buses carrying dozens of released prisoners arrived in Beitunia in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The freed men, with their heads' shaved, descended from the bus, flashing V-for-victory signs; some were lifted
up onto the shoulders of the crowd, while others sunk into chairs nearby exhausted.
“It was an indescribable journey of suffering — hunger, unfair treatment, oppression, torture and curses — more than anything you could imagine,” said Kamal Abu Shanab, a 51-year-old Fatah member from the West Bank town of Tulkarem.
His face gaunt, he said he lost 139 pounds (59 kilograms) in prison.
“We don’t recognize him. He’s not the person we knew. Our uncle doesn’t look like our uncle,” said his niece, Farah Abu Shanab.
The releases have powerful resonance on both sides.
For Israelis, they're deeply painful, since some of those being release have been convicted over attacks that killed civilians and soldiers. For Palestinians, the issue of prisoners is among the most politically charged, with nearly every Palestinian having a friend or family member who has been jailed by Israel, particularly young men.
While Israel views them as terrorists, many Palestinians consider the prisoners as freedom fighters resisting a decades-long Israeli military occupation.
In previous exchanges, both sides have sought to tightly manage the releases — including the images, clothing and ceremonies — because of their political sensitivity.
The 2,000 include some 1,700 of the several thousand Palestinians that Israeli troops seized from Gaza during the 2-year war and have held without charge.
Those slated for release also include 250 Palestinians sentenced to prison terms, most of them convicted of murder and terrorism in deadly attacks on Israelis dating back decades as well as others convicted on lesser charges, according to Israel's Justice Ministry. The longest serving among them has been imprisoned for nearly 40 years.
In the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, giant crowds awaited outside Nasser Hospital for the arrival of detainees being returned to the territory.
Some of the 250 convicted Palestinians will return home to east Jerusalem or the West Bank, while a majority will be sent to Gaza or into exile abroad.
In the morning before the releases, Palestinians gathered on hills overlooking Ofer Prison in the West Bank, awaiting friends and relatives to be released. An armored Israeli vehicle drove up the hill from the prison fired tear gas and rubber bullets at one side of the hill.
As drones buzzed overhead, the crowd scattered. The tear gas followed the circulation of a flier warning that anyone supporting what it called “terrorist organizations” risked arrest.
“You have been warned,” read the flier, which The Associated Press obtained on the site.
Israel has warned people in the West Bank against celebrating — as has frequently happened in past releases, a Palestinian Authority official and the family of a prisoner told AP. In neighborhoods where prisoners’ families live, Israeli forces distributed fliers saying that “anyone who participates in such activities exposes himself to punishment and arrest,” the official said.
Israel’s military did not respond to questions about the flier or restrictions. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press, and the family because they feared reprisals. Israel’s military did not respond to questions about restrictions or warnings.
The rapid developments since last week’s ceasefire agreement have left questions up to the last minute over who will be freed. Israel released a list of some 250 convicted prisoners it would free, but Hamas sought changes. Early Monday, Hamas published the names of just over 1,900 prisoners and detainees it said were slated for release, though Israel did not confirm the list.
Israel has provided little information about the 1,700 from Gaza to be freed. Israeli forces detained thousands of Palestinians over the course of the war during raids on shelters and hospitals and at checkpoints stopping families as they were fleeing their homes amid military operations. Hundreds have been released over the course of the war.
Monday's release still leaves about 1,300 Palestinians from Gaza in Israeli custody, according to a count of detainees in September by the Israeli human rights group Hamoked.
According to Hamas's list, the Gaza detainees to be freed include two women, six teenagers under 18 and around 30 men over 60. Most of the detainees have ben held under new laws passed in Israel at the start of the war that allowed Palestinians to be detained for months as “unlawful combatants” without judicial review or access to lawyers. Rights groups, the U.N. and detainees have reported routine abuse in the detention facilities, including beatings and insufficient food. Israel says it adheres to its prison standards under law and investigates any reports of violations.
The list of 250 convicted prisoners to be freed, ranging in age from 19 to 64, includes 159 affiliated with Fatah, the political party that runs the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank, and 63 associated with Hamas. The remainder are unaffiliated or belong to other groups.
Many were arrested in the early 2000s, which saw the eruption of the Second Intifada, a Palestinian uprising fueled by anger over continued occupation despite years of peace talks. The uprising turned bloody, with Palestinian armed groups carrying out attacks that killed hundreds of Israelis, and the Israeli military killing several thousand Palestinians.
Some were convicted in military trials that rights advocates say often lack due process. Othes have been incarcerated for months or years without trial in what is known as administrative detention. Israel says the practice, widely criticized by Palestinians and human rights groups, is needed to prevent attacks and avoid sharing sensitive intelligence.
The list does not include the roughly half dozen highest profile prisoners, including Marwan Barghouti, Hassan Salameh, Ahmed Saadat and Abbas Al-Sayyed. Barghouti is widely seen as a potential successor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Israel's list includes:
A 51-year-old Palestinian police officer and Fatah member, Sheikh was sentenced to multiple life terms in 2000 for his role in the killing of two Israeli soldiers who were attacked by a mob at a West Bank police station, including one thrown from the station's window.
A 57-year-old Hamas commander imprisoned for life in 1993 — before the Oslo interim peace accords — Issa was among those convicted of kidnapping and killing a 29-year-old Israeli border police officer that year. Much of his more than three decades behind bars were spent in solitary confinement, conditions that have made him a symbol among prisoners’ rights advocates.
The two brothers — 56-year-old Mohammed and 62-year-old Abdel Jawad Shamasneh — were in 1993 sentenced to multiple life terms for their role in a stabbing attack that killed Israeli hitchhikers whose bodies were later found in a Jerusalem riverbed in 1990 during the first Palestinian intifada.
A 47-year-old Fatah member serving a life sentence, Fatafta was one of two men convicted of murder for stabbing American tourist Kristine Luken and a friend who was hiking with her and survived.
__ Associated Press writer Lee Keath in Cairo contributed to this report.
