Israel released some 400 Palestinian prisoners on Thursday to the delight of their families in a bid to bolster Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas and fulfil a pledge made in February. The gesture came a day after the 70-year-old Abbas underwent "routine" medical tests in Amman, including a heart examination, at the end of a marathon overseas tour. "I am in good health," he told reporters afterwards. Hundreds of freed Palestinians were welcomed as heroes by friends and relatives in the West Bank after being bused to four drop-off points near the cities of Hebron, Tulkarem, Ramallah and Jenin.
Another 20 were released at the Erez crossing between Israel and Gaza.
At Beitunia, east of Ramallah, 77 prisoners were welcomed by overjoyed relatives and well-wishers waving flags and holding up pictures of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
The crowd burst into songs lauding Arafat, who died last November, and the more than 6,000 Palestinian detainees who remain in Israeli custody.
The former detainees then made their way immediately to the Muqataa, the Palestinian leadership compound in Ramallah, to pay their respects at Arafat's grave.
"The joy I feel is tinged with sadness for the prisoners we have left behind in greater suffering than those in Guantanamo," said Majid Barghuti, who was freed 80 days before his 16-month sentence was due to expire.
At the Taybeh checkpoint near Tulkarem, detainees thrust arms out of bus windows flashing the V for victory sign, before getting out to kiss the ground.
The Prisoner Club, the main Palestinian detainee rights group, said 209 of those freed had less than a year of their sentences to serve.
Approving the releases, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said the move was to "strengthen the moderate elements within the Palestinian Authority" and respect commitments made at a February peace summit to free a total of 900 prisoners.
"This is insufficient because all prisoners should be freed. The prisoners' issue is at the top of Abu Mazen (Abbas) and the government's agenda," Abbas aide Tayeb Abdelrahim told former detainees at the Muqataa.
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