Television networks broadcast shortly after 5.00 local time Sunday afternoon the moment the three hostages were handed over to the Red Cross.

Footage showed three female hostages emerging from a vehicle surrounded by armed Hamas men.

The hostages were being taken into vehicles belonging to the International Committee of the Red Cross while the gunmen shouted the name of the armed wing of Hamas.

“The three female hostages were officially handed over to the Red Cross in Al-Sharaya Square in the Al-Rimal neighborhood in the western Gaza City,” a Hamas official tells AFP.

A spokesman for the Palestinian Authority said in an email from an Israeli official.