Hamas is pressuring Israel to release prominent prisoners as part of the Gaza deal

Hamas has been pressing Israel to include prominent Palestinians on its prisoner release list – as part of a ceasefire agreement that will also see hostages returned from Gaza.

Hamas’s insistence comes after the Israeli Ministry of Justice published the names of 250 prisoners to be released, but excluded seven prominent prisoners, including Marwan Barghouti and Ahmed Saadat.

The men, who are serving sentences after being convicted of involvement in separate deadly attacks in Israel, have long been viewed by Palestinians as symbols of resistance.

Twenty Israeli hostages are expected to be released before 12:00 (09:00 GMT) on Monday as part of the deal proposed by US President Donald Trump.

A senior Palestinian official familiar with the talks told the BBC that US envoy Steve Witkoff promised to raise the issue of excluding Palestinian prisoners with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but Israel strongly refused to include them.

It is not clear whether this could be a sticking point, or affect the timeline for the release of hostages from the Gaza Strip and Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli prisons.

The prisoners are scheduled to be released in the first phase of Trump’s ceasefire and hostage return agreement, which was approved this week to end the two-year-old war in Gaza.

It is unclear how the hostages will be released this time, as on previous occasions Hamas paraded them openly, angering Israel and many of its Western allies.

The bodies of the deceased hostages will also be returned. It is believed that at least 26 hostages were killed, while the fate of two others was unknown.

Israel will also release about 250 Palestinian prisoners serving life sentences in Israeli prisons, in addition to another 1,700 Palestinians from Gaza who have been arrested.

Hamas had submitted a list of the names of the prisoners it wanted to release, including Barghouti and Saadat.

Barghouti is serving five life sentences plus 40 years after being convicted in 2004 of planning attacks that killed five civilians.

Opinion polls have consistently indicated that he remains the most popular Palestinian leader, and that Palestinians will vote for him in the presidential elections ahead of current Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas or Hamas leaders.

Barghouti remains a prominent figure in the Fatah movement that dominates the Palestinian Authority, which governs parts of the occupied West Bank not under Israeli control.

Saadat, leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was sentenced to 30 years in prison after being convicted in 2008 of heading an “illegal terrorist organization” and being involved in attacks, including the assassination of an Israeli minister in 2001.

Among the 250 prisoners scheduled to be released is Iyad Abu Al-Rub, the leader of the Islamic Jihad movement convicted of masterminding suicide bombings in Israel that killed 13 people in the early 2000s.

According to the Israeli Ministry of Justice, he will either be released to Gaza or deported abroad.

The BBC has learned that Hamas is also pushing for the release of some potential additional prisoners. These concern Palestinian prisoners who were released years ago as part of the Gilad Shalit hostage exchange, and then were rearrested after October 7.

Hamas says that since they were part of a previous hostage exchange, they should not be included in the 250 figure.

In Israel, hospitals are preparing to release the hostages while their families await their return.

The first phase of the agreement between Israel and Hamas saw the ceasefire enter into force on Friday and the partial withdrawal of Israeli forces from parts of Gaza. Hundreds of aid trucks are now expected to enter daily. The next stages are still under negotiation.

Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from southern Gaza have returned to Gaza City, weeks after fleeing an Israeli attack that destroyed much of the city.

The Hamas-run Civil Defense Agency in Gaza said it was conducting recovery operations and recovering bodies from the rubble, while Palestinians remained missing throughout the Strip.

The Israeli war on Gaza was sparked by Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which approximately 1,200 people were killed and 251 hostages were taken.

The Hamas-run Health Ministry says 67,682 Palestinians have been killed since then in the Israeli military assault on Gaza.

Additional reporting by Mallory Munsch