The first 3 hostages arrived in Israel after the release of Hamas. Here’s what we know.

The first three hostages were released in Gaza as part of the fragile situation ceasefire agreement and release of hostages in the middle Israel and Hamas which started working on Sunday have arrived in Israel, the army said. Their mothers were waiting to meet them.

The three women – identified by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum as 24-year-old Romi Gonen, 31-year-old Doron Steinbrecher and 28-year-old Emily Damari – were released by Hamas terrorists from the Red Cross at around 10:30 . am EST, 5:30 pm local time. They were held since October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks Israel.

The Red Cross has donated to the Israel Defense Force in Israel to receive their first health checks at special reception areas near the Gaza border, a senior IDF official said.

Brett McGurk, Biden’s National Security Council coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, said on Sunday’s “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that he had spoken to his Israeli counterparts about the hostage situation.

“I know they’re alive,” McGurk said. “They were kept in deplorable conditions for 470 days, but the Israelis have an excellent plan to take care of them, and they will get the care they need and be reunited with their families.”

About 250 people were kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attacks that began 15 months of war. About 100 hostages remain in Gaza, after all others have been freed or their bodies found.

Hours before Sunday’s ceasefire, which many hope is the first step toward ending the war, Israel announced that it had recovered the body of Oron Shaul, a soldier killed in the 2014 Israel-Hamas war and whose remains have been kept by the militants ever since.

Both McGurk and incoming Trump national security adviser Mike Waltz told “Face the Nation” that Israeli-American star Edan Alexander will be released in the next phase. “We’re going to get him out, period,” Waltz said.

Here’s what we know about them:

Romi Gonen, 24

Gonen was kidnapped at the Nova music festival in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. That morning, Gonen’s mother, Merav, and his eldest daughter spent nearly five hours talking to Gonen as soldiers stormed the festival grounds. Gonen told his family that the roads full of abandoned cars made it difficult to escape and that he would seek shelter in other trees.

He said the words that kept echoing in his mother’s head every day. “Mom, I was shot, the car was shot, everyone was shot. … I’m injured and I’m bleeding. Mom, I think I’m going to die,” recounted Romi, in a press conference a few weeks after the incident. being kidnapped.

Over the past 15 months, Merav has been one of the loudest voices advocating for the return of the hostages, appearing almost daily on Israeli news programs and traveling abroad on missions.

“We are doing everything we can so that the world will not forget,” Merav told the Associated Press on the 6th anniversary of the Hamas offensive. “Every day we wake up and take a deep breath, take a deep breath, keep going, keep doing things that will bring him back.”

Emily Damari, 28

Damari is a British-Israeli citizen who was kidnapped from his apartment in Kibbutz Kfar Aza, a collective farming village that has been hit hard by Hamas attacks. He lived in a small apartment in an old people’s area. Soldiers breached the kibbutz’s border fence and ransacked the area.

Kibbutz Kfar Aza said that Damari used to be “the glue that held together his closest group of friends” and regularly organized gatherings of friends in the front corner of the barbecue throughout the kibbutz.

“All Emily’s mother Mandy wants to do is hug Emily. But she won’t believe it until she sees it,” Emily Cohen, representing the Damari family, told a CBS News colleague before her release.

Doron Steinbrecher, 31 years old

Steinbrecher is a veterinary nurse who loves animals, and is Damari’s neighbor at Kibbutz Kfar Aza.

At 10:20 on October 7, 2023, Steinbrecher called his mother. “Mom, I’m scared. I’m hiding under the bed and I can hear them trying to get into my house,” her brother, Dor, recalled, according to the Associated Press.

Steinbrecher was featured in a video released by Hamas on Jan. 26, 2024, along with two other female Israeli soldiers.

How will the other captives be released?

Gonen, Steinbrecher and Damari are the first three hostages to be released under the newly implemented ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, which will be implemented in phases.

The first phase of the ceasefire calls for Hamas to release 33 hostages within six weeks. They include women, children and hostages over the age of 50, according to a draft seen by CBS News.

On the first day of the deal, three hostages were to be released by Hamas. On the seventh day, the four captives would be released. After that, Hamas released three hostages taken from Israel every seven days, starting with the living and moving on to return the bodies of the dead.

More than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israel will also be released in the first phase of the deal. Israel was expected to release 90 prisoners in exchange for the freedom of the first three hostages.

“These are critical and emotional hours for the families and for all of Israel,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement. “While we welcome each hostage returning home, we remain deeply concerned about our loved ones who may be left behind. Now, more than ever, we need the community to stand with us until the last hostage returns. We will not leave anyone behind. Only with our united power can we ensure that everyone returns – the living will be rehabilitated once and for all.” and the deceased to be buried properly.”