Hamas has said it has handed over 13 Israeli hostages, three Thai nationals and a person with Russian citizenship who had been held in the Gaza to the Red Cross on the third day of the truce between Israel and the militant group.
The release of some of the hostages captured when Hamas fighters rampaged through southern Israel on 7 October is expected to be mirrored by the Israelis freeing another group of 39 Palestinian prisoners as on previous days in the truce.
The four-day truce is the first halt in fighting in the seven weeks since Hamas killed 1,200 people and took about 240 hostages back into Gaza.
In response to that attack, Israel has vowed to destroy the Hamas militants who run Gaza, bombarding the enclave and mounting a ground offensive in the north. Some 14,800 Palestinians have been killed, Gaza health authorities say, and hundreds of thousands displaced.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this afternoon met security forces inside Gaza and indicated that the campaign was far from over.
"Nothing will stop us, and we are convinced that we have the strength, the power, the will and the determination to achieve all the goals of the war, and that is what we will do," he said.
Mr Netanyahu is expected to speak to US President Joe Biden later.
The killing of a Palestinian farmer in central Gaza had earlier added to concerns over the fragility of the truce.
The farmer was killed when targeted by Israeli forces east of Gaza's long-established Maghazi refugee camp, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said there was "reason to believe" a US hostage would be released from captivity in Gaza. Mr Sullivan declined to give the hostage's identity.
Thirteen Israelis and four Thai nationals arrived in Israel after a second release of hostages held by Hamas following an initial delay caused by a dispute about aid delivery into Gaza.
Egypt and Qatar acted as mediators on Saturday to maintain the truce.
The armed wing of Hamas also said earlier that four of its military commanders in Gaza had been killed, including the commander of the North Gaza brigade, Ahmad Al Ghandour. It did not say when they had been killed.
Qatar, Egypt and the United States are pressing for the truce to be extended beyond Monday but it is not clear whether that will happen.
Israel had said the ceasefire could be extended if Hamas continued to release at least ten hostages a day. A Palestinian source had said up to 100 hostages could go free.
Six of the group of 13 Israelis released on Saturday were women and seven were teenagers or children. The youngest was three-year-old Yahel Shoham, freed with her mother and brother, although her father remains a hostage.
Israel freed 39 Palestinians - six women and 33 teenagers - from two prisons, the Palestinian news agency WAFA said.
Some of the Palestinians arrived at Al-Bireh Municipality Square in Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where thousands of citizens awaited them, a Reuters journalist said.
Violence flared in the West Bank where Israeli forces killed seven Palestinians, including two minors and at least one gunman, late on Saturday and early this morning, medics and local sources said.
Even before the 7 October attacks from Gaza, the West Bank had been in a state of unrest, with a rise in Israeli army raids, Palestinian attacks, and violence by Israeli settlers in the past 18 months. More than 200 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since 7 October, some in Israeli air strikes.
Saturday's swap follows the previous day's initial release of 13 Israeli hostages, including children and the elderly, by Hamas in return for the release of 39 Palestinian women and teenagers from Israeli prisons.
The four Thais freed on Saturday "want a shower and to contact their relatives", Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin said on social media platform X. All were safe and showed few ill-effects, he said.
"I'm so happy, I'm so glad, I can't describe my feeling at all," Thongkoon Onkaew told Reuters by telephone after news of the release of her son Natthaporn, 26, the family's sole breadwinner.
The deal risked being derailed when Hamas' armed wing said on Saturday it was delaying releases until Israel met all truce conditions, including committing to let aid trucks into northern Gaza.
Saving the deal took a day of diplomacy mediated by Qatar and Egypt, which President Biden also joined.
Al-Qassam Brigades also said Israel had failed to respect terms for the release of Palestinian prisoners that factored in their time in detention.
COGAT, the Israeli agency for civilian coordination with the Palestinians, accused Hamas itself of delaying trucks trying to deliver humanitarian aid to northern Gaza at a checkpoint.
"To Hamas, residents of Gaza are their last priority," it said earlier.
Saturday also brought hours of waiting for the families of hostages, some of whose joy was tempered by the continued captivity of others.
