Hamas frees U.S. hostage Edan Alexander in goodwill gesture to Trump
Hamas agreed to release Alexander, the last living U.S. hostage in Gaza, after talks with the Trump administration. His parents traveled to Israel from New Jersey.
Updated
May 12, 2025 at 12:39 p.m. EDT3 minutes ago
Israelis gather in Tel Aviv's Hostages Square as they wait for the release of Israeli-American soldier Edan Alexander from Hamas captivity in Gaza, on Monday. (Heidi Levine/FTWP)
By Claire Parker, Lior Soroka, Shira Rubin, Mohamad El Chamaa and Heidi Levine
JERUSALEM — Hamas released Israeli American Edan Alexander from captivity in Gaza after more than 19 months, in a gesture to the Trump administration following direct talks between U.S. and Hamas officials in recent days.
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Alexander was handed over to representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Khan Younis and transferred to the Israeli military on Monday evening local time, the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement. He is expected to be flown to a facility in southern Israel to undergo initial medical examinations and reunite with his parents, who traveled from New Jersey to meet him. If his health allows, he will then fly to Qatar to meet Trump and Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, his family told Israeli media.
Alexander’s transfer to Israel came less than 24 hours after Hamas announced late Sunday that it would release the 21-year-old unconditionally. He was the last living American held hostage in Gaza, and Hamas’s decision to free him was seen as a goodwill gesture amid efforts to reach a ceasefire with Israel.
Hamas released Alexander to the ICRC without fanfare on Monday, a notable departure from the staged transfer ceremonies the militants organized during a brief ceasefire earlier this year, and that were criticized by Israeli and U.S. officials as exploitative and cruel.
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“This was a step taken in good faith towards the United States and the efforts of the mediators — Qatar and Egypt — to put an end to this very brutal war and return ALL living hostages and remains to their loved ones. Hopefully this is the first of those final steps necessary to end this brutal conflict,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform Sunday night.
The negotiations bypassed Israeli officials, in what many here interpreted as a sign of increasingly strained relations between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Trump.
Israel learned about the deal to release Alexander only late Sunday, even as Israeli officials suspected talks were underway while Trump prepared for his Middle East trip, according to an Israeli individual familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk with reporters.
Netanyahu met with President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, and U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee in Jerusalem on Monday afternoon to discuss the latest efforts to achieve a larger hostage deal, the prime minister’s office said in a statement. Afterward, he ordered an Israeli delegation to travel to Doha on Tuesday for talks.
“The Prime Minister made clear that negotiations will take place only under fire,” the statement added.
Netanyahu also thanked President Trump in a phone call Monday for helping to secure Alexander’s release, according to his office.
The umbrella group representing hostage families gathered supporters in Tel Aviv to cheer Alexander’s arrival — even as it called for a broader deal to bring home the dozens more hostages remaining in Gaza.
Israel’s security cabinet approved plans last week to expand operations in Gaza, including by seizing and holding more territory in the besieged Palestinian enclave.
“The expected release of IDF soldier Edan Alexander without anything in return will be possible due to the vigorous policy that we have led with the backing of President Trump, and thanks to the military pressure of IDF soldiers in the Gaza Strip,” Netanyahu’s office said Monday morning. It added that Israel has not agreed to a ceasefire or to free Palestinian prisoners — “only to a safe corridor that will allow for the release of Edan.”
But the vast majority of Israelis think their country should pursue a ceasefire deal to bring home all the hostages, according to recent polls, and disillusionment with the war is growing among reservists Israel relies on to carry out the fight.
Alexander’s family thanked Trump and Witkoff for brokering the agreement in a statement Sunday and urged the Israeli government and negotiating teams to keep pushing for the release of all remaining hostages, “ending this nightmare for them and their families. No hostage should be left behind."
Alexander, born in Israel and raised largely in New Jersey, volunteered to join the Israel Defense Forces after he graduated from high school three years ago, according to local news outlet NorthJersey.com. On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas militants streamed into southern Israel, killed about 1,200 people, captured Alexander and some 250 others and dragged them to Gaza.
Ceasefire deals and several Israeli military rescue missions brought about the release of 145 hostages. The military has retrieved the bodies of dozens more. Fifty-eight Israelis remain in Gaza, 24 of whom are believed to be alive. Trump sent their families into a panic in recent days when he suggested that the number thought to be alive had fallen to 21.
The bodies of four Americans presumed by Israel to be dead — Omer Neutra, Itay Chen, Gadi Haggai and Judi Weinstein Haggai — are still being held by militants in Gaza. “Trump is showing leadership taking care of his citizens, and I pray Netanyahu will do the same,” Ruby Chen, Itay’s father, told The Washington Post on Monday.
Family members of the remaining hostages, speaking at a rally of supporters in Tel Aviv on Monday, pleaded with the Trump administration and Netanyahu to help bring their loved ones home.
“My son Nimrod is still alive, still struggling down in the tunnels, still has to wait until our prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, will come to the decision that his best way to survive as a prime minister is to free the hostages. I don’t want to wait,” Yehuda Cohen, father of IDF soldier Nimrod Cohen, 20, who was captured from the same base as Alexander, told the crowd. “Mr. Donald Trump, special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff, Adam Boehler: Please continue the job.”
Demonstrators marched to the U.S. embassy office in Tel Aviv Monday afternoon to reinforce the message.
Israel’s retaliatory war in Gaza, meanwhile, has killed more than 52,800 Palestinians and injured close to 120,000, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says the majority of the dead are women and children. Israel has leveled vast stretches of the enclave, rendering much of Gaza uninhabitable and displacing nearly all of the population at least once. For more than two months, Israel has blocked any humanitarian aid from entering the Strip, plunging its inhabitants deeper into a humanitarian crisis.
Israeli strikes in Gaza killed at least 29 people in the past 24 hours, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The announcement of Alexander’s expected release came as Trump prepares to travel to the region for his first overseas trip since returning to the White House in January, with plans to stop in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — notably leaving out Israel. Trump has teased plans to announce a diplomatic breakthrough in the Middle East during his trip, and negotiations to reach a ceasefire in Gaza have kicked into high gear in recent days, according to Hamas officials and mediating countries Egypt and Qatar.
Witkoff was probably sent Monday to “deliver the message, from Trump to Netanyahu, that this is Israel’s last chance to sign on to a bigger deal,” the Israeli individual familiar with talks said. “One that would include more or all the hostages, as well as Saudi normalization, which would require a Palestinian component, and for which Netanyahu has huge majority support in the Knesset.”
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said in an interview with Israel’s Channel 12 on Saturday said that the U.S. “isn’t required to get permission from Israel” to make deals that serve its interests. “It’s a matter of what becomes our immediate business, to protect our citizens,” he said, while calling suggestions that this view reflects a rift between Trump and Netanyahu an “unfair characterization.”
Hamas said in a statement Sunday it was ready to “immediately begin intensive negotiations and exert serious efforts to reach a final agreement to end the war, exchange prisoners by mutual consent, and ensure the administration of the Gaza Strip by an independent and professional body.”
For Netanyahu, though, ending the war could mean losing the support of his hawkish far-right coalition partners — probably catalyzing his political downfall.
An Israel official said the government intended to move forward on its plans to escalate the war in Gaza if a ceasefire agreement doesn’t come together soon.
“If no deal is reached to release additional hostages under the Witkoff framework before Trump leaves the region — we will launch the intensified operation,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues.
Soroka, Rubin and Levine reported from Tel Aviv and El Chamaa from Beirut. Andrew Jeong in Seoul and Gerry Shih in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
