Hundreds of Israeli hostage supporters took to Central Park on Sunday for what might be their final rally — just hours before Hamas was set to free the 20 living captives who remained in the group’s clutches.
Inbal Bachar, who is awaiting one of her relatives to return, hailed the moment as the dawn of a new day as she thanked President Trump for securing the cease-fire deal to free the hostages.
“Maybe in just a few hours. Maybe even now, a new day has begun. We will sit…watching the living return home,” she told the crowd in Manhattan as Hamas was set to begin releasing the captives early Monday.
“We will see them step off the trucks, running into the arms of their families, embracing after two years without a hug, and in the same breath we will bow our heads as coffins are carried back to Israel to be laid to rest with dignity in our land,” she added.
The exchange marks the end of a two-year nightmare for the hostages, 20 of whom are believed to still be alive.
Trump will arrive in Israel to oversee the historic exchange as families wait with bated breath to learn the fate of their loved ones following months of reports and briefings informing them that at least 26 of the 48 hostages are presumed dead.
The president will be joined by top members of his cabinet, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, with more than 20 world leaders expected to arrive for the cease-fire summit on Monday.
As per the cease-fire agreement, Hamas had agreed to free the living hostages and the bodies of the dead whose whereabouts it knows around 1 a.m. ET on Monday.
An international effort is set to begin amid the cease-fire to locate the corpses of the missing, a venture that Israel said could take more than 10 days to complete.
It remains unclear how many bodies Hamas and its extremist allies, who took part in the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack, have lost in the more than two years of war.
Despite the unknowns that remain, the crowd that gathered in Central Park celebrated the eve of the exchange with chants of “They’re coming home!”
Nogah Rotstein, a Brooklyn resident and cousin to captives’ twins Gali and Ziv Berman, said her family was grateful for the weekly support in Manhattan over the last two years, with everyone waiting to hear that the exchange went off without a hitch.
“We all have all these feelings right now, I’m sure, of anxiety, trepidation and hope, to just keep that positivity going and to trust this is going to happen,” she said of the looming release.
The Berman twins are among the hostages who are believed to still be alive. Israeli-American freed hostage Keith Siegel described the men as injured the last time he saw them in the Hamas tunnels following his release earlier this year.
The hostages set to be released have suffered 737 days in captivity, with former hostages reminding the world that the freed have endured months of torture, starvations and cruelty under Hamas terrorists.
Survivors have said Hamas regularly beat, raped, and starved their captives — with propaganda video from the terror group showing how hostages were forced to dig their own graves as a symbol that they would never leave Gaza alive.
Following the release, the hostages are expected to be taken to Israeli medical facilities to be treated, as other previous captives have arrived with injuries and severe cases of malnutrition.
Israel’s National Institute of Forensic Medicine said it was ready to use advanced technology, fingerprints, dental matching and DNA extraction to identify the bodies released — a process that could take days.
During the last hostage exchange, Hamas incorrectly delivered the body of an unknown Palestinian woman instead of slain mother Shiri Bibas, causing worldwide outrage and nearly sinking the short-lived cease-fire agreement.
Like many at the Central Park event, Bachar thanked Trump for securing the cease-fire deal that will see the hostages freed in the coming hours and pave the way for the end of the Israel-Hamas war.
“In the end, he got a deal signed,” said Dana Cwaigrach, co-founder of the Hostages Families Forum. “All we can do is show our appreciation to the Trump administration.”
Although optimistic about the looming exchange, Cwaigrach said there was still anxiety in the air over the previous failed cease-fires.
“Obviously it’s a very emotional moment but it’s not over until it’s over. Until we see them in Israel, it’s not over,” she said.
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