An Israeli ministerial committee Monday approved a list with the names of 200 Palestinian militants who will be freed from Israeli prisons later this month, an Israeli official said.
The release is a "goodwill gesture" to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ahead of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan, to start this year September 1.
The 200 prisoners will be released "in the coming days," Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokesman, Mark Regev, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
He was as yet unable to give a specific date.
The 200 are all "security prisoners," held for membership in Palestinian militant organizations declared illegal in Israel, involvement in attempted shooting and bomb attacks or possession of weapons.
They are members of militant off-shoots of Abbas' Fatah party and the move is aimed at strengthening the standing of the moderate Palestinian president opposite the radical Islamic Hamas movement ruling Gaza. No Hamas members are among those to be released.
Since Israel declared the revival of negotiations with Abbas at a peace summit in Annapolis, Maryland in November, it has freed some 400 Palestinian prisoners, nearly of them Fatah members.
Most of those on the list to be freed before the start of the Ramadan are held for minor security offences.
But the list includes two Palestinians "with blood on their hands," the definition Israel uses for militants who took part or abetted in "successful" attacks against Israelis that resulted in deaths or injuries.
The two are Said al-Atabeh and Mohammed Abu Ali Yatta, the longest and the second-longest held Palestinian prisoner in Israel, who served more than, and almost, 30 years in jail respectively.
Abu Ali Yatta killed an Israeli policeman in the southern West Bank city of Hebron in 1979 and has since also killed a Palestinian prisoner in jail whom he accused of collaboration with Israel.
Al-Atabeh carried out a triple bombing in the central Israeli city of Petah Tiqwa in 1977, in which an Israeli woman was killed and some 20 other people injured.
Both are now around 50.
In Israel, the debate over whether to release Palestinian prisoners "with blood on their hands" is highly emotional, with relatives of victims often demanding they remain behind bars.
The Israeli cabinet on Sunday approved the release 16 against four.
A more limited forum of ministers gave final authorization of the list Monday.
Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter and Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz, both of Olmert's ruling, centrist Kadima party, voted against.
Mofaz, a relative hawk and a former army chief of staff and defence minister who runs in next month's Kadima primaries, said the release of prisoners "with blood on their hands" was a sign of "weakness."