Lead PA negotiator Saeb Erekat. Photo: wiki commons.

JNS.org – Although U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said last week that the Israeli and Palestinian negotiating teams would keep the details of their renewed talks confidential, chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat on Saturday said Israel would release 26 Palestinian prisoners on Aug. 13, Israel Hayom reported.

This will be the first phase of the four-stage prisoner release, entailing the freeing of 104 Palestinian terrorists imprisoned before the 1993 Oslo Accords, that Israel agreed to in order to restart Israeli-Palestinian conflict negotiations.

The Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) is currently formulating the lists of the four groups of Palestinian prisoners to be released over the course of the next nine months, the time window that has been set for the new negotiations.

On July 28, the Israeli cabinet approved the release of 104 terrorists who have been imprisoned in Israeli jails since before the 1993 Oslo Accords.