More than a thousand Palestinian prisoners, many , held without charge for years within the Israeli prison system, are preparing for their first taste of freedom.
It’s unclear how many prisoners will be exchanged for Israelis imprisoned in Gaza. The ceasefire agreement’s text hasn’t yet been made public, and details from media reports have been provided that vary depending on whether or not Palestinian prisoners are serving life sentences.
There are currently 10, 400 Palestinians in Israeli prisons, not including those detained from Gaza during the last 15 months of conflict, according to the Palestinian Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees , Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.
If the ceasefire agreement is to be implemented, a list of 95 Palestinian women and children is scheduled to be released on Sunday, according to the Israeli Ministry of Justice. Darüber hinaus, no names of the prisoners who will be released are not known.
According to the deal’s outline, their release will not take place before Sunday at 4pm local time (14: 00 GMT).
According to media reports, the majority of the names on Israel’s list of names were taken after the Hamas attacks on October 7, 2023. Fewer than 10 were arrested before the attacks.
Phase one
More than 1, 000 Palestinian prisoners will be exchanged for 33 of the remaining Israeli prisoners, who are reportedly around 100 in total, during the first phase of the three-phase agreement between Hamas and Israel.
Palestinian prisoners will be freed in exchange for Israeli prisoners, according to the terms of the agreement, according to the mediators’ agreement in Doha and with international agreements.
Nine ill and injured Israeli prisoners who have been sentenced to life in Israeli courts will be exchanged for 110 of them, according to reports. In addition, Israeli men over the age of 50 will be released in exchange for Palestinian captives at a ratio of 1: 3 for those sentenced for life sentences, and 1: 27 for those serving other sentences.
Previous prisoner exchanges
In Israel’s negotiations with Palestinian organizations, prisoners have long been used as currency.
In a move to bolster negotiations that had been stalled in the 2013 peace talks, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the time, Israel agreed to the delayed release of more than 100 Palestinians.
However, the prisoner exchanges of 1983, when more than 4,500 Palestinian prisoners were exchanged for six Israeli soldiers, have more striking similarities to the present exchange. Similarly, in 1985, some 1, 150 Palestinian prisoners were swapped for three Israeli soldiers. Similar in scope to the most well-known prisoner swap, which involved the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in 2011?
Gilad Shalit exchange
1, 027 Palestinian prisoners were exchanged in 2011 for Shalit, who was captured by Hamas in a 2006 cross-border raid and held for five years as negotiations for his release flailed.
Following the abduction and ultimately murder of three Israeli teenagers in the occupied West Bank in 2014, the Israeli government admitted to having re-incarcerated 51 of those prisoners. Explaining those arrests afterwards, Netanyahu made no attempt to link those arrested to the missing teenagers, saying only that their abduction sent “an important message” to Hamas.
High profile prisoners
According to Israeli Army Radio, one of the Palestinian prisoners who will be released on Sunday is Khalida Jarrar, a leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinians are also calling for the release of several other high-profile prisoners, including some who are serving life sentences.
Among them is one of the Palestinian group Fatah’s leading figures, Marwan Barghouti, whose long-awaited release has been repeatedly blocked by Israeli authorities. The release of Barghouti, who helped bring the numerous disparate Palestinian factions together in the writing of the Palestinian Prisoners’ Document in 2006, may have significant effects on Palestinian politics because the unifying figure has consistently won over Palestinians when asked to choose a presidential candidate in upcoming elections.
Contacted by Al Jazeera on Friday, representatives for Barghouti, including family members, said that while they were hopeful, they have received no information about his possible release.
Ahmed Saadat, the head of the PFLP, is another well-known Palestinian prisoner who was accused by Israel of ordering the 2001 killing of Rehavam Ze’evi, the country’s tourism minister, despite the Justice Ministry’s initial ruling that there was not enough evidence to charge him with the murder.
What have the prisoners endured?
Rights groups have long expressed concern about the conditions in the Israeli prison system, despite the locations where many of the prisoners slated for release are being held.
A network of Israeli detention facilities, which the Israeli rights  organization B’Tselem referred to as “torture camps,” were detailed in an extensive report released in August. The global NGO Human Rights Watch also published reports on the Israeli prison system in July and August, detailing rape,  , the sharing of sexualised images of Palestinian prisoners, including children, and the systemic torture of detainees.
In July 2024, the Israeli minister responsible for the prison system, far-right politician Itamar Ben-Gvir, boasted that “everything published about the abominable conditions” Palestinians were subjected to in Israeli jails “was true”.
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