Nearly a hundred Palestinian prisoners released by Israel arrived Thursday afternoon in two buses to the West Bank town of Ramallah, where their families, medical teams and hundreds of people are waiting to welcome them with Palestinian flags and the Palestinian nationalist movement Fatah.

Even in war, branding applies. Israel and Hamas are engaged in a parallel battle of optics despite a ceasefire that took effect Jan. 19 after more than a year of devastating war.

It is believed that at least two of the six American hostages still held in Gaza are alive — Sagui Dekel-Chen, 35, who grew up in Bloomfield, Connecticut, and Edan Alexander, 19, from Tenafly, New Jersey. Four other Americans are believed to have been killed in captivity.

Hamas militants freed an American Israeli and two other men held hostage in the Gaza Strip and Israel released 183 Palestinian prisoners amid the cease-fire.

Hamas released eight hostages on Thursday — five Thai farm workers and three dual German-Israeli nationals — in exchange for 110 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. This is the third round of exchanges in the Gaza ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas,