Who are the Palestinian prisoners released by Israel?

In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, celebrations erupted as 90 Palestinian prisoners, mostly women, were released under a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. Families in the West Bank received their released loved ones early Monday morning, most of whom had been detained without charges.

The ceasefire deal ended more than 15 months of Israeli war on Gaza, and also saw the release of three Israeli hostages. More hostages and prisoners are expected to be released in the coming weeks. The released Palestinian prisoners included 69 women and 21 children, who were released around 1 a.m. Monday and transported to the West Bank city of Ramallah in Red Cross buses.

Of the 90 prisoners, only eight were arrested before October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led Palestinian groups launched an attack in southern Israel that killed more than 1,100 people and took about 250 captive, triggering Israel's war on Gaza. Israel has killed over 47,000 Palestinians in its offensive on Gaza and has been criticized for using excessive force against civilians and for attacking hospitals and schools. Furthermore, Israel has also killed more than 850 Palestinians and detained over 7,000 in raids in the West Bank.

Among the released prisoners, one of the most notable was Khalida Jarrar, a leader of the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and a feminist activist. Since 2015, Jarrar has served time in Israeli prisons for publicly advocating for the rights of Palestinian prisoners and for her association with an "illegal" political party. Israel considers the PFLP a "terrorist organization." Human Rights Watch said in a 2016 statement that Jarrar's multiple arrests were part of Israel's broader crackdown on nonviolent political opposition by Palestinians to its half-century-long military occupation. Her most recent arrest was on December 26, 2023.

Jarrar was first arrested in March 1989 during an International Women's Day protest at Birzeit University in the West Bank, where she was a master's student. She rose to prominence as a feminist leader who fought against gender stereotypes and worked to empower women entrepreneurs in the West Bank. She also did community work in Nablus, helping to clean public spaces and improve public schools. Later, she was elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council. She served as the director of Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association from 1994 to 2006. “We are living in a double feeling: On one hand, we thank everyone for the freedom, and on the other hand, we are in pain for losing so many Palestinian martyrs,” Jarrar told the Associated Press after her release.

Another prominent prisoner released was journalist Rula Hassanein, an editor at the Watan Media Network in Ramallah. She was arrested by Israeli forces on March 19 as part of a mass arrest campaign against Palestinians. Hassanein, 30, was tried in an Israeli military court at Israel’s Ofer prison. She was charged with incitement on social media, allegedly including reposting posts on X and her expressions of suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.

The first phase of the three-stage ceasefire will last 42 days. During this time, 33 Israeli hostages, including female civilians and soldiers, as well as children and elderly civilians, will be released. In exchange, up to 1,900 Palestinian prisoners will be released. On the first day of the exchange, three Israeli hostages were released from Gaza: Romi Gonen, 24, Emily Damari, 28, and Doron Steinbrecher, 31. Prior to their release, it was believed that about 100 hostages remained in Gaza, and it is unclear how many are still alive. In addition to the 33 scheduled to be released in the first phase, the remaining hostages are reportedly male soldiers, who will be released in exchange for an unspecified number of Palestinian prisoners.

According to the Palestinian Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs Commission and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society, there were 10,400 Palestinians in Israeli prisons before the release of 90 prisoners on Monday, not including those detained in Gaza during the past 15 months of war. “If they do something minuscule to challenge the status quo, they face imprisonment,” Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim said. Ibrahim said that many children are imprisoned by Israel for throwing stones at Israeli forces. “The list of released prisoners, hundreds of names, most of them are administrative detention, which is a tactic that Israel uses to keep people in prison indefinitely without charges,” Ibrahim said.

“I left hell and now I’m in heaven. We all left hell. They used to abuse us, beat us, fire tear gas at us,” Abdulaziz Atawneh, a boy released from an Israeli prison on Monday, told media. “There was no food, no sweets, no salt,” he said. Israeli prisons are notorious for mistreating Palestinian prisoners, and observers commented that Jarrar appeared frail compared to when she was last arrested. UN agencies, investigators, and human rights organizations have documented arbitrary arrests, inhumane and degrading treatment, torture, and deaths of Palestinians in Israeli detention.

On the other hand, the hostages who were released and transferred to Israel appeared to be in good health, Israeli media reported. The Israeli military said in a statement that the three hostages "just arrived at a hospital with their mothers, where they will reunite with their families and receive medical treatment.” The three released hostages are being treated at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv. In April, Dr. Adnan Bursh, the head of the orthopedic department at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, died in Israel’s Ofer prison. His family said that Bursh was tortured to death. “Releasing Palestinian prisoners, including women and children, does not mean that the conditions of imprisonment have changed. Israeli negotiators insisted that there will be no changes inside Israeli prisons,” Bashir Farraj, an assistant professor at Birzeit University, told Al Jazeera.

“This is actually very worrying, and it also explains why families are gathering to receive their loved ones because they know the hell that [the prisoners] went through was brutal.” Farraj added, “It shows that this system of imprisonment is meant to destroy the Palestinian prisoners. It’s consciously trying to destroy their spirits and souls.”