Israel expects hostages to be freed from Gaza ‘in a few hours’ as ceasefire holds

CAIRO — Israel said Sunday that it expected all of the living hostages held in the Gaza Strip to be released Monday in its breakthrough ceasefire deal with Hamas, as Palestinians awaited the release of hundreds of prisoners held in Israel and a surge of aid into the famine-stricken territory.

“In a few hours, we will all be reunited,” Israel’s military chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, said in a statement.

President Trump planned to leave later in the day to visit Israel and Egypt to celebrate the ceasefire announced last week that offered hope for an end to the two-year war.

“We are expecting all 20 of our living hostages to be released together at one time to the Red Cross and transported among six to eight vehicles,” Israeli government spokesperson Shosh Bedrosian said, noting that Israel did not expect militants to stage the exchanges in the same manner as previous rounds.

Bedrosian said the hostages will be driven to a military base to reunite with their families or, if needed, immediately to a hospital.

After the hostages are freed, Israel was ready to release about 2,000 Palestinian detainees and receive the 28 hostages believed to be dead. The military planned to hold a ceremony on their behalf in Gaza, Bedrosian added.

The dead are expected to be transferred to the Institute of Forensic Medicine for identification.

An international task force will start working to locate deceased hostages who are not returned within the 72-hour period, said Gal Hirsch, Israel’s coordinator for the Hostages and the Missing. Officials have said the search for the bodies of hostages, some of whom may be buried under rubble, could take time.

Timing has not been announced for the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israel who are to be freed. They include 250 people serving life sentences in addition to 1,700 seized from Gaza during the war and held without charge.

A Palestinian official said a Hamas delegation was in Cairo speaking with mediators about the list of prisoners. The official said the militant group is pressing for the release of Marwan Barghouti, the most popular Palestinian leader and a potentially unifying figure, along with several others serving life sentences. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. There was no immediate comment from Israel, which views Barghouti as a terrorist leader.

Israel has warned Palestinians in the West Bank against celebrating after the releases, according to a prisoner’s family and a Palestinian official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it. Israel’s military did not immediately respond to questions.

The Israeli military body in charge of humanitarian aid in Gaza said the amount of aid entering the Palestinian territory was expected to increase Sunday to around 600 trucks per day, as stipulated in the agreement.

“Much of Gaza is a wasteland,” U.N. humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the Associated Press. He said the United Nations has a plan for the next two months to restore basic medical and other services, bring in thousands of tons of food and fuel and remove rubble.

Egypt said it was sending 400 aid trucks into Gaza on Sunday. AP video showed dozens of trucks crossing the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing. The Egyptian Red Crescent said the vehicles carried medical supplies, tents, blankets, food and fuel. The trucks will head to the inspection area in the Kerem Shalom crossing for screening by Israeli troops.

Expanding Israeli offensives and restrictions on humanitarian aid have triggered a hunger crisis, including famine in parts of the territory.

The United Nations has said it has about 187,000 tons of food, medicine and other humanitarian aid ready to enter once Israel gives the green light. Abeer Etifa, a spokeswoman for the World Food Program, said workers were clearing and repairing roads Sunday in Gaza to make way for the deliveries.

The fate of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an Israeli- and U.S.-backed contractor that replaced the United Nations aid operation in May as the primary food supplier in Gaza, remained unclear.

Food distribution sites operated by the group in the southernmost city of Rafah and central Gaza were dismantled after the ceasefire deal, several Palestinians said Sunday.

The foundation had been touted by Israel and the United States as an alternative system to prevent Hamas militants from taking over aid. But its operations were mired in chaos and bloodshed, as hundreds of Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire while heading to its four sites. The Israeli military has said its troops fired warning shots to control crowds.

A foundation representative said in a statement that some distribution sites might be temporarily closed during the transfer of hostages to Israel, but “there is no change to our long-term plan.”

The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, which has the equivalent of 6,000 trucks of aid waiting outside Gaza in Egypt and Jordan, also had no clarity on its role in the scaled-up relief effort. Jonathan Fowler, a spokesperson for the agency, known as UNRWA, said the organization was “standing ready” to contribute and has enough food in its warehouses for the entire Gaza Strip population for three months.

Trump, who pushed to clinch the ceasefire deal, is expected to arrive Monday morning in Israel. He will meet with families of the hostages and speak at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, according to a schedule released by the White House.

Trump will then continue to Egypt, where the office of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi has said he will co-chair a “peace summit” Monday with regional and international leaders.

Although both Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza welcomed the halt to the fighting and plans to release the hostages and prisoners, the longer-term fate of the ceasefire remains murky. Key questions about governance of Gaza and the postwar fate of Hamas, including its proposed disarmament, have yet to be resolved.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on X that he had instructed the military to prepare to begin destroying the network of tunnels built by Hamas under Gaza “through the international mechanism that will be established under the leadership and supervision of the U.S.” once the hostages are released.

How that will be achieved with Israeli forces having pulled back within Gaza was not immediately clear.

Palestinians continued to move back to areas vacated by Israeli forces Sunday, although many were returning to homes reduced to rubble.

Satellite photos taken Saturday and analyzed by the Associated Press showed a line of vehicles traveling north to Gaza City along the strip’s coastline. Tents along the coast also could be seen near Gaza City’s marina, where many have been living to avoid Israeli bombardment of the city.

Armed police in Gaza City and southern Gaza patrolled the streets and secured aid trucks driving through areas from which the Israeli military had withdrawn, residents said. The police force is part of the Hamas-run Interior Ministry.

The ministry said in a statement Sunday that it would allow members of armed gangs not involved in the killing of Palestinians to turn themselves in as early as Monday, “repent and be pardoned.” As for others, it noted some gangs took advantage of the situation to carry out out extrajudicial activities.

The pause in fighting allowed first responders to search previously inaccessible areas for bodies buried under rubble. Health officials said 233 bodies were recovered and brought to hospitals since Friday, when the truce went into effect.

Yasser el-Bureis, who was at the morgue in Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis, said Sunday that he and his relatives had finally retrieved the bodies of his two cousins killed months earlier as they tried to flee their homes.

“For five months, we didn’t manage to recover the bodies,” he said.

Hospitals have run short on supplies for both the living and the dead, including body bags.

The war began when Hamas-led militants launched a surprise attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and around 250 taken hostage.

In Israel’s ensuing offensive, more than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants but says around half the deaths were women and children. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government, and the U.N. and many independent experts consider its figures to be the most reliable estimate of wartime casualties.

The war has destroyed large swaths of Gaza and displaced about 90% of its 2 million residents. Hunger is widespread, and famine has been declared in Gaza City and other areas.

The violence has also triggered other conflicts in the region, sparked worldwide protests and led to allegations of genocide, which Israel denies.

Magdy, El Deeb and Lidman write for the Associated Press. Lidman reported from Tel Aviv. AP writers Jon Gambrell in Cairo, Sam Mednick in Tel Aviv, Abby Sewell in Beirut and Sam Metz in Ramallah, West Bank, contributed to this report.