The first three hostages to be freed from Gaza have been handed over to Israeli forces, the military said Sunday, hours after a fragile cease-fire between Israel and Hamas took effect.

Israeli media, broadcasting live footage from Qatar’s Al Jazeera, showed the hostages walking towards Red Cross vehicles as their convoy moved through Gaza City. The vehicles were followed by armed men wearing green Hamas headbands who fought to keep the cars safe from the unruly crowd that swelled to thousands.

Meanwhile, in Tel Aviv, thousands of people gathered to watch the news on big screens with cheers. For months, many gathered in the square to demand a cease-fire agreement.

The agreement opens an initial six-week period of calm and raises hopes for the release of dozens of hostages held by the militants and an end to the devastating 15-month war. Hamas’s last-minute delay delayed the start of the ceasefire by nearly three hours and underscored its fragility.

Even before the ceasefire took effect, celebrations broke out across the territory and some Palestinians began returning to their homes. Israel earlier announced the names of the first three hostages to be released in exchange for the planned release of 90 Palestinian prisoners later on Sunday.

The truce, which began at 11:15 a.m. local time, is the first step toward a final end to the conflict and the return of nearly 100 hostages kidnapped in the October 7, 2023, attack by Hamas.

An Israeli official confirmed that Romi Gonen, 24, Emily Damari, 28, and Doron Steinbrecher, 31, were the hostages who were freed on Sunday. Gonen was abducted from the Nova music festival, while the others were abducted from Kibbutz Kfar Az. Damari is an Israeli-British dual citizen.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to comply with regulations, said the families had approved the release of the names.

Meanwhile, between 8:30 a.m. and when the ceasefire took effect, Israeli fire killed at least 26 people, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. It was not stated whether they were civilians or fighters. The army has warned people to stay away from Israeli forces as they withdraw to a buffer zone inside Gaza.

Israel’s hard-line national security minister, meanwhile, said his Jewish Power faction was leaving the government in protest at the ceasefire deal. The departure of Itamar Ben-Gvir weakens the coalition of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but will not affect the truce.

In a separate development, Israel announced that it had found the body of Oron Shaul, a soldier killed in the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas, in a special operation in Gaza. The bodies of Shaul and another soldier, Hadar Goldin, remained there after the 2014 war and were not returned.

A fragile agreement

The ceasefire deal was announced last week after a year of mediation by the United States, Qatar and Egypt. Both the outgoing Biden administration and President-elect Donald Trump’s team have pressed for a deal before Monday’s inauguration.

Netanyahu warned on Saturday that he has Trump’s support to continue the fight if necessary.

In the 42-day first phase of the ceasefire, 33 hostages from Gaza should be returned and hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees freed. Many displaced Palestinians should be able to return home.

There should also be an increase in humanitarian aid, with hundreds of trucks entering Gaza daily, far more than Israel previously allowed. The United Nations World Food Program said trucks began entering through two crossings after the ceasefire came into effect.

This is only the second ceasefire of the war, longer and more consistent than the one-week pause in November 2023, with the potential to end the fighting for good.

Negotiations on the far more difficult second phase of this ceasefire should begin in just over two weeks. Big questions remain, including whether the war will continue beyond the first phase and how the rest of the hostages in Gaza will be freed.

Palestinians celebrate despite the delay

Celebrations broke out across the Gaza Strip as people hoped for respite after fighting killed tens of thousands of people, destroyed large swaths of territory and displaced most of the population.

Masked militants appeared at some celebrations, where crowds chanted slogans in support of them, Associated Press reporters in Gaza reported. Hamas-run police began deploying in public after being largely subdued by Israeli airstrikes.

Some families started home on foot, their belongings loaded onto donkey carts.

In the southern city of Rafah, residents returned to find massive destruction. Some found human remains including skulls in the ruins.

“It’s like watching a Hollywood horror movie,” resident Mohamed Abu Taha told the AP as he surveyed the ruins of his family’s home.

Israelis divided over ceasefire deal

In Israel, people remained divided over the agreement.

Asher Pizem, 35, from the town of Sderot near Gaza, said he had been eagerly awaiting the return of the hostages, but said the deal only postponed the next conflict with Hamas. He also criticized Israel for allowing aid into Gaza, saying it would contribute to the resurgence of the militant group.

“They will take their time and attack again,” he said as he looked out over the smoldering ruins of Gaza from a small hill in southern Israel with other Israelis gathered there.

Israel’s cabinet approved the ceasefire early Saturday in a rare session during the Jewish Sabbath, more than two days after mediators announced the deal.

Immense toll

The toll of the war was enormous, and new details about its extent are now emerging. The head of Gaza’s Rafah municipality, Ahmed al-Sufi, said the Israeli army had destroyed much of the infrastructure, including water, electricity and road networks, along with thousands of homes.

More than 46,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which says women and children make up more than half of the victims, but does not distinguish between civilians and fighters.

The Hamas-led attack on southern Israel that sparked the war killed more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and the militants kidnapped about 250 others. More than 100 hostages were freed during a week-long ceasefire in November 2023.

Approximately 90 percent of Gaza’s population has been displaced. The United Nations says homes, the health system, road networks and other vital infrastructure have been severely damaged. Reconstruction – if the ceasefire reaches its final stage – will take at least several years. Major questions about the future of Gaza, political and otherwise, remain unresolved.

Here’s a look at the three hostages freed on Sunday:

Romi Gonen, 24

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Romi Gonen was abducted from the Nova music festival in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. That morning, Gonen’s mother, Merav, and her older daughter spent nearly five hours talking to Gonen while militants ransacked the festival grounds. Gonen told her family that the roads clogged with abandoned cars made it impossible to escape and that she would seek shelter in some bushes.

Then she said the words that echo in her mother’s head every day. “Mom, I was shot, the car was shot, everyone was shot. … I am wounded and bleeding. Mom, I think I’m going to die,” Romi told a press conference a few weeks after the kidnapping.

Not knowing what to do, Merav Gonen tried to convince her daughter that she would not die, to start breathing and to treat her wounded friends. According to Merav, Gonen’s last words during the call were a scream of “Mom!” as the gunfire approached and men’s shouts drowned out everything.

Then the phone went off. Israeli authorities identified the location of her phone in Gaza.

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

“We’re doing everything we can so the world doesn’t forget,” Merav told The Associated Press on the six-month anniversary of the Hamas attack. “Every day we wake up and take a deep breath, take a deep breath and keep walking, keep doing the things that will bring her back.”

Emily Damari, 28

Emily Damari is a British-Israeli citizen abducted from her apartment in Kibbutz Kfar Az, a communal farming village that was hit hard by the Hamas attack. She lived in a small apartment in the youth quarter, the part of the kibbutz closest to Gaza. The militants broke through the border fence of the kibbutz and ransacked the neighborhood.

Damara’s mother, Mandy, said she likes music, travel, football, good food, karaoke and hats. Kibbutz Kfar Aza said that Damari was often “the glue that held her close group of friends together” and that she always organized gatherings of friends around the best barbecue corner in the entire kibbutz.

“I keep that glimmer of hope that I still have in my heart that she survived, despite her suffering,” Mandy Damari said outside Damari’s burned-out apartment last January. “I am desperate, angry and terrified for her life.”

Doron Steinbrecher, 31

Doron Steinbrecher is an animal-loving veterinary nurse and neighbor of Damari in Kibbutz Kfar Az.

At 10:20 a.m. on October 7, 2023, Steinbrecher called her mother. “Mom, I’m afraid. I hide under the bed and hear them trying to enter my apartment – her brother Dor recalled. She could send a voice message to her friends. “They have me! They have me! They have me!” in the moments of her abduction.

That message was instrumental in helping her family realize that Doron had been kidnapped.

Steinbrecher was shown in a video released by Hamas on January 26, 2024, along with two other female Israeli soldiers. Her brother said the video gave them hope she was alive, but raised concerns because she looked tired, weak and emaciated.

In total, militants killed 64 people and 22 soldiers, and kidnapped 19 people from Kibbutz Kfar Az on October 7. After the return of Steinbrecher and Damari, there are still three members of the kibbutz in Gaza: American-Israeli Keith Siegel, 65, and twins Gali and Ziv Berman, 27.

With files from Melanie Lidman