Both Hamas and Israel are indicating a willingness to extend the ceasefire deal beyond the four-day timeline.
Hamas announced in a statement on Sunday local time that it is seeking to extend the truce should serious efforts be made to increase the number of Palestinian detainees released from Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that he told US President Joe Biden that Israel will resume its campaign in Gaza with full force once the temporary truce comes to an end.
However, Mr Netanyahu also said he would welcome extending it if it facilitated the release of 10 additional hostages every day, as agreed under the original Qatari-brokered deal.
The Israeli army's chief spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said it was open to extending the ceasefire if more hostages were released.
Ahead of the latest hostage release, Mr Netanyahu visited the Gaza Strip, where he spoke with troops.
"At the end of the day we will return every one," he said of the hostages.
"We are continuing until the end, until victory. Nothing will stop us," Mr Netanyahu said.
Israel releases 39 Palestinian prisoners after Hamas hands over 17 hostages
Hamas says it has handed over 13 Israeli hostages, three Thai nationals and a person with Russian citizenship who had been held in the Gaza Strip to the Red Cross on the third day of a truce between Israel and the militant group.
In exchange, another group of 39 Palestinian prisoners were freed as on previous days under the truce deal, the Israeli prison service said.
At a news conference, US President Joe Biden said he hoped the pause in fighting between Israel and Hamas can go on as long as prisoners are getting released.
He said he hoped more Americans would be released by Hamas although he did not have firm news.
Mr Biden said among the released hostages were a four-year-old Israeli-American girl, Abigail Edan, who had witnessed her parents being killed by Hamas fighters during their October 7 raid into Israel.
"What she endured is unthinkable," Mr Biden said.
"She's been through a terrible trauma," he said.
Most hostages were handed over directly to Israel, waving to a cheering crowd as they arrived at an air force base.
Israel's army said one was airlifted to a hospital, and the director of Soroka Medical Center said Elma Avraham, 84, was in life-threatening condition as "a result of an extended period of time when an elderly woman was not taken care of as needed".
Also freed were sisters Ely, aged eight, and her sister Dafna, 15, whose father was shot dead during the Hamas attack.
In all, nine children aged 17 and younger were on the list, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office.
Hamas said a Russian-Israeli, Ron Krivoy, was freed due to Russia's support of Palestine.
"In response to the efforts of Russian President Vladimir Putin and in appreciation of the Russian position in support of the Palestinian cause, the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas released one of the detainees of the Russian citizenship," it said in a statement.
Thailand's Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin thanked all parties involved in the release and called for the remaining 18 Thai hostages to be freed.
He said the released hostages were healthy, no one needed urgent medical attention and "everyone walks and talks normally".
Fourteen Thai nationals who were held hostage by Hamas are expected to return to the country in the next few days.
The Palestinian prisoners released were children and young men, ages 15-19, largely accused of public disorder, property damage and in some cases causing or threatening physical harm to Israeli officers by throwing stones and Molotov cocktails.
It was the third consecutive day in which Hamas released Israeli hostages it has been holding in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
A fourth exchange is expected to take place on Monday – the last day of the four-day ceasefire between the enemies. A total of 50 hostages and 150 Palestinian prisoners are to be freed.
Farmer killed in Gaza
The Palestine Red Crescent says a Palestinian farmer has been killed after being targeted by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip, as a truce between Israel and Hamas enters a third day.
There was no immediate comment from Israel on the report and it was not clear if it would impact the latest phase of plans to swap hostages in Gaza for prisoners in Israeli jails over a four-day period.
A senior Palestinian source said Sunday's phase looked "complicated". Asked by Reuters if the farmer's killing could delay a third batch of releases, the source replied: "I don't know."
The second group of Israeli hostages were released late on Saturday after an initial delay caused by a dispute about aid delivery into Gaza.
Although the issue was resolved through mediation by Egypt and Qatar, it underscored the fragility of the truce, the first halt in fighting since the October 7 terror attack by Hamas on southern Israel.
The armed wing of Hamas also announced on Sunday the killing of four of its military commanders in the Gaza Strip, including commander of the North Gaza brigade Ahmad Al Ghandour. However, it was not clear when they had been killed.
The IDF later confirmed the killings of five commanders, saying it happened "prior to the operational pause".
The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said the farmer was killed and another was injured on Sunday in the Maghazi refugee camp in the centre of Gaza.
Maghazi, in the central part of the Gaza Strip, is home to the families or descendants of refugees from the 1948 war over the creation of the state of Israel.
Seven killed in West Bank
Violence flared in the West Bank, where Israeli forces killed seven Palestinians, including two minors and at least one gunman, late on Saturday and early Sunday, medics and local sources said.
Even before the October 7 attacks, the West Bank had been in a state of unrest, with a rise in Israeli army raids, Palestinian attacks, and violence by Israeli settlers in the past 18 months.
More than 200 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since October 7, some in Israeli air strikes.
Some 14,800 people, roughly 40 per cent of them children, have been killed in Gaza, Palestinian health authorities said on Saturday, since the October 7 attack by Hamas who killed 1,200 people and took about 240 hostages.
Reuters, ABC News