By Matthew Sedacca | The New York Post
Four female Israeli soldiers kidnapped by Hamas terrorists from a southern military base 477 days ago were freed Saturday in the second hostage exchange under the ongoing Gaza cease-fire deal.
The women — Karina Ariev, 20; Daniella Gilboa, 20; Naama Levy, 20; and Liri Albag, 19 — were received by the International Committee of the Red Cross, who coordinated with Hamas to secure the handover.
Their release comes six days after Israel received the first three hostages released once the initial phase of the cease-fire deal went into effect, bringing fighting in the brutal 15-month war to a halt.
In exchange for the soldiers’ release, Israel is expected to turn over 200 Palestinian convicts from its prisons, some of whom were serving life sentences, according to Reuters.
Last Sunday’s handoff saw the release of Emily Damari, 28, Romi Gonen, 23, and Doron Steinbrecher, 31, but only after an hours-long delay in the start of the truce because Hamas was violated the terms of the deal.
Under the agreement, the terror group must give Israel the names of the hostages slated to be freed at least 24 hours ahead of their release.
In exchange, Israel released 90 Palestinian prisoners, all women and children.
In the latest exchange, Israel accused Hamas again of violating the accord’s terms, which require the terror group to release all female civilians first, followed by female IDF soldiers, then the elderly and the ill.
On Friday, the terror group released the names of four female soldiers it was handing off, despite a pair of civilians — Arbel Yehud, 29, and Shiri Silberman Bibas, 33 — still held hostage in Gaza.
Israel this week demanded Hamas include Yehud, who was kidnapped from her home in in Kibbutz Nir Oz, among the captives released this weekend, as the terms of the deal stipulate.
Yehud is believed to be held by the terror group Palestinian Islamic Jihad, not Hamas, complicating her release, The Times of Israel reported, citing Israel’s Channel 12.
Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top Israeli officials convened and informed mediators the list violated the terms of their deal, but decided to move forward with the exchange.
All four hostages released Saturday were surveillance soldiers kidnapped from the Nahal Oz military base on the Gaza border during Hamas’ brutal attack on Oct. 7, 2023.
Albag, from central Israel’s Moshav Yarhiv, was featured in a Hamas propaganda video released January, saying she was “living in a nightmare” and pleading for the Israeli government’s rescue.
Albag’s family, who described the teen as aspiring to be an interior designer or architect, said the twisted footage had “torn our hearts to pieces” and they begged Netanyahu and his fellow Israeli leaders to act on the hostages’ fate “as if your children were there.”
Gilboa, from Petah Tikva, and Ariev, of Jerusalem, also were seen in a separate propaganda video created by the terror group in January 2024, along with Doron Steinbrecher, who was among the trio of hostages freed on Sunday.
“I am under bombardment and fire 24 hours a day. I am very, very scared for my life,” Gilboa said in the clip, which her parents allowed to be publicized in July in the hopes of sparking a hostage deal.
Levy, of Ra’anana, had aspirations for working in diplomacy, and has been a member of an organization that promoted peace between Israeli, Palestinian and US youth according to her mother, Ayelet Levy Sachar.
The morning of the attack, she sent her mother a final text that she was in a safe room, only to be seen later in a disturbing Hamas video being dragged barefoot by a gun-toting terrorist into the backseat of a Jeep, her hands bound and sweatpants covered in blood.
“The images of your abduction broadcast to the world are images that I cannot unsee,” her mother wrote in an open letter, adding, “It’s too much for a mother to bear.”
Harrowing bodycam footage from a Hamas gunman released last year showed the four women pressed up against a wall while handcuffed and covered in blood — as the corpses of their slain comrades surrounded them.
In the clip, the terrorists could be heard bragging and discussing raping the women, while calling them “dogs” and commanding them to pose with their captors.
A fifth surveillance soldier seen in the video who was kidnapped, Agam Berger, 21, is still held hostage by the terror group. A sixth female soldier who was abducted from the Nahal Oz base was rescued by the IDF in October 2023, while the corpse of another hostage from the military post was found weeks later.
Under the first phase of the truce, the two sides now will continue weekly exchanges for another five weeks, with Israel set to receive a total of 33 hostages, the majority alive, in exchange for over 1,900 Palestinian prisoners and detainees. Of the roughly 90 people still held hostage in Gaza by terrorists, the Jewish state believes at least a third are dead.
Israel also withdrew its military forces to a buffer zone in Gaza to allow displaced Palestinians to return to their homes, and humanitarian aid including food and medical supplies has poured into the war-torn territory.
On day 16 of the 42-day truce, Hamas and Israel agreed to begin hashing out the details for the next phase of the deal, which was broadly outlined as seeing all the remaining hostages released in exchange for a permanent cease-fire in Gaza.
The looming negotiations, however, are rife with sticking points for both sides, which could ultimately lead to the cease-fire deal’s collapse.
Israel has repeatedly said it would not completely pull out from Gaza until Hamas relinquishes all of its military and political control of the region, while the terror group insists it wouldn’t hand over the remaining hostages until Israel’s forces leave the territory.
The final phase of the deal would see Hamas give back any remaining hostages’ corpses in exchange for a three- to five-year reconstruction plan in Gaza under international supervision.
The cease-fire deal, which was nearly derailed at the 11th hour, brought a temporary calm to the conflict sparked by Hamas’ bloody surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, where the terror group and its allies killed about 1,200 people and dragged another 251 back to Gaza as hostages.
Over 47,000 Palestinians have been killed during Israel’s subsequent military siege, according to Hamas-run Gazan health officials — who do not differentiate between combatants and civilians.
With Post wires