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Israel Says Eight Hostages Including Five Thais to Be Freed Thursday

Tents are set up next to houses destroyed by Israeli bombardment in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, after Israel began allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to the heavily damaged area last Monday.(AP)
Tents are set up next to houses destroyed by Israeli bombardment in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, after Israel began allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to the heavily damaged area last Monday.(AP)
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Israel Says Eight Hostages Including Five Thais to Be Freed Thursday

Tents are set up next to houses destroyed by Israeli bombardment in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, after Israel began allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to the heavily damaged area last Monday.(AP)
Tents are set up next to houses destroyed by Israeli bombardment in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza Strip, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, after Israel began allowing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to the heavily damaged area last Monday.(AP)

Hamas will release three Israelis, including two women and an 80-year-old man, as well as five Thai nationals during the next hostage release, slated for Thursday, officials from Israel and Hamas said as a tenuous ceasefire between the sides moves ahead.  

The officials named the Israeli women as Arbel Yehoud, 29, Agam Berger, 19, and the man as Gadi Moses, 80.

The officials, who spoke on Wednesday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said the hostages’ families had approved the publication of their names.  

The identities of the Thai nationals were not immediately known.  

A number of foreign workers were taken captive along with dozens of Israeli civilians and soldiers during Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 attack that set off the war in Gaza.  

The expected release will keep up the momentum of the fragile ceasefire between Israel and the Hamas group that began earlier this month and which paused the 15-monthlong war in Gaza.  

As part of the deal, Hamas is releasing hostages in phases in exchange for freedom for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.  

Hostages and prisoners will be released twice this week  

The deal had been negotiated for months under the Biden administration but was finally sealed after President Donald Trump threatened there would be “hell to pay” if the hostages weren't returned.

Trump's Mideast envoy, Steve Witkoff, was in Israel on Wednesday and met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who heads to Washington next week to meet Trump — the first foreign leader to meet the US president in his second term in office.  

Thursday's release wasn't originally scheduled but came as a result of a standoff between Israel and Hamas over the identities of the hostages released over the weekend.  

Israel had demanded that Yehoud, a civilian, be part of that group and when she wasn't freed, Israel held up the movement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians looking to return to what is left of their homes in the war-battered north of Gaza.  

International mediation efforts brought about the additional release on Thursday and cleared the way for Palestinians to stream north.  

Another release is slated for Saturday, which Netanyahu's office said would free male hostages.  

Dozens of Palestinian prisoners are set to be freed both Thursday and Saturday. 

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Arab World

Lebanon: Hezbollah Claims Targeting 10 Israeli Merkava Tanks

Israeli tanks near the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israeli conflict with Iran continues, in northern Israel, March 25, 2026. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
Israeli tanks near the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israeli conflict with Iran continues, in northern Israel, March 25, 2026. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
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Lebanon: Hezbollah Claims Targeting 10 Israeli Merkava Tanks

Israeli tanks near the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israeli conflict with Iran continues, in northern Israel, March 25, 2026. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
Israeli tanks near the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, amid escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, as the US-Israeli conflict with Iran continues, in northern Israel, March 25, 2026. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu

Lebanon's Iran-aligned Hezbollah group said Thursday that it struck10 Israeli Merkava tanks in three southern towns along the border.

In a series of separate statements, Hezbollah said that its members targeted the advanced Israeli tanks with guided missiles in the towns of Deir Siryan, Debel, and Al-Qantara, and achieved confirmed hits.

Earlier, Hezbollah said it targeted the headquarters of the Israeli Ministry of War in the center of Tel Aviv, and the Dolphin barracks of the Military Intelligence Division north of Tel Aviv with a number of missiles.

The Israeli military said an Israeli soldier was killed in fighting in south Lebanon after the army announced it was conducting ground operations against Hezbollah.

"Staff sergeant Ori Greenberg, aged 21, from Petah Tikva, a soldier of the Reconnaissance unit, Golani Brigade, fell during combat in southern Lebanon," the military said.

In total, three Israeli soldiers have been killed in fighting in south Lebanon since Hezbollah drew the country into the Israel and US war on Iran by launching rocket attacks against Israel on March 2 to avenge the killing of Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei.

Israel is responding by launching large-scale raids on Lebanon, while its forces have advanced into southern Lebanon.

After the Lebanese Presidency repeatedly announced its readiness to open direct negotiations with Israel in order to end the war, Hezbollah announced its refusal to negotiate "under fire."

Its Secretary-General, Naim Qassem, said Wednesday in a statement: "When negotiating with the Israeli enemy under fire is proposed, it is an imposition of surrender and a deprivation of all of Lebanon's capabilities."

He called on the government to "reverse its decision to criminalize resistance and the resistance fighters," after announcing a ban on the party's security and military activities, as part of a series of unprecedented measures it has taken since the outbreak of the war.

Arab World

At Least 28 Civilians Killed in Sudan Drone Strikes

Displaced Sudanese families from Kurdufan at a football stadium in the town of Kadugli, south of the region (AP)
Displaced Sudanese families from Kurdufan at a football stadium in the town of Kadugli, south of the region (AP)
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At Least 28 Civilians Killed in Sudan Drone Strikes

Displaced Sudanese families from Kurdufan at a football stadium in the town of Kadugli, south of the region (AP)
Displaced Sudanese families from Kurdufan at a football stadium in the town of Kadugli, south of the region (AP)

Two drone strikes in Sudan, one at a market in Darfur and the other along a road in Kordofan, killed at least 28 civilians, health workers told AFP Thursday.

The three-year war between Sudan's army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has seen a recent uptick in near-daily drone strikes that kill dozens at a time.

On Wednesday, a strike hit a market in North Darfur state's Saraf Omra town, killing "22 people, including an infant, and injuring 17 more", one health worker at the local clinic told AFP.

"The drone hit a parked oil truck, which caught fire along with part of the market," said Hamid Suleiman, a vendor at the market, which serves Saraf Omra and the surrounding towns in the remote Darfur area.

Some 800 kilometers (500 miles) east of the RSF's strongholds in Darfur, another drone strike set fire to a truck travelling on a North Kordofan road in army territory.

"Six bodies arrived at the hospital yesterday, three of them charred, in addition to 10 wounded," a medical source at the local hospital in El-Rahad told AFP, blaming the RSF for the attack.

The civilians were travelling between the army-controlled towns of El-Rahad and Um Rawaba.

Drones from both sides have repeatedly attacked Sudan's central east-west highway, which runs through North Kordofan state capital El-Obeid and connects Darfur to the army-controlled east.

Sudan's war has killed tens of thousands and left some 11 million displaced, in the world's largest hunger and displacement crisis.

Arab World

Guterres Names Envoy for Middle East… Warns of a Wider War

FILED - 14 May 2025, Berlin: United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres holds a press conference at the Federal Chancellery. Photo: Kay Nietfeld/dpa
FILED - 14 May 2025, Berlin: United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres holds a press conference at the Federal Chancellery. Photo: Kay Nietfeld/dpa
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Guterres Names Envoy for Middle East… Warns of a Wider War

FILED - 14 May 2025, Berlin: United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres holds a press conference at the Federal Chancellery. Photo: Kay Nietfeld/dpa
FILED - 14 May 2025, Berlin: United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres holds a press conference at the Federal Chancellery. Photo: Kay Nietfeld/dpa

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday named veteran French diplomat Jean Arnault as his personal envoy to support efforts to end the Middle East conflict, saying the “world is staring down the barrel of a wider war.”

Guterres told reporters that he had been in close contact with many in the region and around the world and that a number of initiatives ⁠for dialogue and peace were underway.

“It is time to stop climbing the escalation ladder – and start climbing the diplomatic ladder,” he said in New York.

The UN chief also warned that prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz was choking movement of oil, gas, and fertilizer at a critical moment in the global food planting season.

Guterres said ⁠Gulf countries are important suppliers of raw materials for nitrogen fertilizers crucial for developing countries.

“Without fertilizers today, we might have hunger tomorrow,” he noted.

Guterres said UN mediators have offered their services and Arnault would do “everything possible” to support peace efforts.

The UN says Arnault has more than ⁠30 years' experience in international diplomacy focusing on peace settlements and mediation, with a background in UN missions in Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America.

His most recent assignment was in 2021 as Guterres' personal envoy on Afghanistan and regional issues.

Disrupted fertilizer shipments and soaring energy ⁠prices are threatening to unleash a fresh food-price surge across vulnerable nations, risking a years-long setback just as many were recovering from successive global shocks, UN and other experts warn.

An analysis released by ⁠the UN World Food Programme last week warned that tens of millions more people will face acute hunger if the Iran war continues through to June.