After the release of Hamas, the first 3 hostages arrived in Israel. Here's what we know.

The first three hostages are released from Gaza as part of Fragile ceasefire and release of hostages between Israel and Hamas which went into effect on Sunday, arrived in Israel, the military announced. They were waiting to meet their mother.

The three women, identified by the Hostage and Missing Persons Forum as 24-year-old Romine Gonen, 31-year-old Doran Steinbrecher and 28-year-old Emilie Damari, were released by Hamas militants to the Red Cross at around 10:30 am. am EST, 5:30 pm local time. They were held after the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

The Red Cross handed them over to the Israel Defense Forces in Israel for an initial well-being check at special reception centers near the Gaza border, a senior IDF official said.

Brett McGurk, the Biden administration's National Security Council coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, said Sunday on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that he had spoken with his Israeli counterparts about the conditions for the hostages.

“I know they're alive,” McGurk said. “They were held in deplorable conditions for over 470 days, but the Israelis have a very good system in place to take them into their care and they will get the care they need and be reunited with their families.”

About 250 people were abducted in a Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 that sparked 15 months of war. About 100 hostages are still in Gaza after the rest have been freed or their bodies found.

Hours before Sunday's cease-fire, which many hope will be the first step toward ending the war, Israel announced that it had received the body of Aron Shaul, a soldier who died in the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas and whose remains are being held by militants from those times.

Both McGurk and Trump's new national security adviser, Mike Waltz, told “Face the Nation” that Israeli-American soldier Edan Alexander will be released in the next step. “We're going to pull him out, period,” Waltz said.

Here's what we know about them:

Romy Gonen, 24 years old

Gonen was kidnapped from the Nova music festival in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. That morning, Gonen's mother, Merau, and her older daughter spent nearly five hours talking to Gonen as gunmen marauded the festival grounds. Gonen told her family that roads clogged with abandoned cars made escape impossible and that she would seek shelter in the bushes.

Then she said the words that echo in her mother's head every day. “Mom, I was shot, the car was shot, everyone was shot… I'm wounded and I'm bleeding. Mom, I think I'm going to die.” – she repeated Romi's wordsat a press conference a few weeks after the kidnapping.

Over the past 15 months, Merov has been one of the most outspoken voices advocating for the return of the hostages, appearing almost daily on Israeli news programs and traveling abroad on missions.

“We're doing everything we can to make sure the world doesn't forget,” Merow told The Associated Press six months of attack by Hamas. “Every day we wake up and take a big breath, a deep breath and keep going, keep doing what's going to bring her back.”

Emily Damory, 28 years old

Damari is a British-Israeli national kidnapped from her apartment in Kibbutz Kfar Az, a communal farming village that was badly hit by the Hamas attack. She lived in a small apartment in a block for young people. Militants broke through the border fence of the kibbutz and devastated the surroundings.

Kibbutz Kfar Aza said Damari was often the “glue that held her close-knit group of friends together,” and she always organized gatherings of friends around the best barbecue corner in the entire kibbutz.

“All Emily's mom Mandy wants is a hug for Emily. But she won't believe it until she sees it,” said Emily Cohen, who represents the Damara family. CBS News is a partner of the BBC before her release.

Doran Steinbrecher, 31 years old

Steinbrecher is an animal-loving veterinary nurse and Damari's neighbor at Kibbutz Kfar Az.

At 10:20 a.m. on October 7, 2023, Steinbrecher called her mother. “Mom, I'm scared. I'm hiding under the bed and I hear them trying to get into my apartment,” her brother Dore recalled, according to the Associated Press.

Steinbrecher was shown in a video released by Hamas on January 26, 2024, along with two other Israeli soldiers.

How will the rest of the hostages be released

Gonen, Steinbrecher and Damari are the first three hostages to be released under the recently implemented cease-fire and hostage release agreement between Israel and Hamas, which will be phased in.

The first phase of the ceasefire calls for Hamas to release 33 hostages within six weeks. They include women, children and hostages over the age of 50, according to a draft seen by CBS News.

On the first day of the deal, Hamas was to release three hostages. Four hostages were to be released on the seventh day. Every seven days thereafter, Hamas released three hostages taken from Israel, starting with the living and then returning the bodies of those who died.

More than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israel will also be released in the first phase of the deal. Israel was expected to release 90 prisoners in exchange for the release of the first three hostages.

“These are critical and emotional hours for the families and for all of Israel,” the Hostage and Missing Persons Forum said in a statement. “While we rejoice for every hostage who returns home, we remain deeply concerned for our loved ones who may remain behind. Now more than ever, we need the public to stand with us until the last hostage returns. We will leave no one behind. Only by united forces can we ensure the return of all – the living for rehabilitation and the dead for a proper burial.”