Tel Aviv (AFP) – On Saturday, the families of 229 hostages held by Hamas intensified their pressure on the Israeli government to present plans to rescue them, as Israeli forces expanded the scope of their violent attack on the Gaza Strip.
Published on: 10/28/2023 – 16:21
3 minutes
After Israel intensified its overnight bombing, the Forum of Families of Hostages and Missing Persons, the main group representing kidnapped persons held by Hamas since the October 7 attacks, sought to meet with ministers immediately.
As families expressed their anger at the “absolute uncertainty regarding the fate of the hostages being held and subject to intense bombing,” hundreds of people gathered in Tel Aviv on Saturday, warning that they might organize street protests unless they get answers.
The demonstrators’ spokesman, Haim Rubinstein, 35, said, “Families do not sleep. They want answers and they deserve answers.”
Families of hostages say that there is little to no communication between them and officials, and that they are left in great pain as a result of the uncertainty regarding the fate of their loved ones.
Inbal Zach, 38, whose relative Tal Shoham was kidnapped from Kibbutz Be’eri along with six members of his family, said, “We don’t know anything about what happened to them. We don’t know if they were injured, if they were seen by a doctor, or if they had food.”
“We are very worried about them,” she added.
Uncertainty
The ongoing hostage crisis raises great concern for many, as the detainees include children, the elderly, and those seriously injured, according to scenes broadcast while documenting their kidnapping.
The Tel Aviv demonstration came on the heels of a night considered one of the most violent in the war. The army bombarded Gaza throughout the night, especially with ammunition to attack tunnels and underground bunkers.
On Saturday, the Israeli army announced that it had “struck 150 underground targets,” announcing the killing of “several Hamas terrorists” and the destruction of “tunnels used by terrorists, underground fighting sites, and other facilities.”
Three weeks after the start of the bombing, the momentum of the strikes was enormous, leading to broken glass windows and ground tremors in Israeli areas close to the border with Gaza.
“The families need to know what the plan is because of what happened yesterday,” Rubinstein said. “It (the bombing) puts the hostages in danger.”
So far only four hostages have been released.
Yocheved Lifshitz, 85, who was among those released, told reporters that she was taken in a “spider web” of tunnels under Gaza, where she was detained with others.
Waiting for explanations
A statement by the families’ gathering said, “No one from the war government bothered to meet with the families to explain one thing: whether the ground operation endangered the lives of the 229 hostages.”
The statement continued, “The families are concerned about the fate of their loved ones and are waiting for an explanation. Every minute feels like an eternity.”
On Thursday, Hamas announced that “about fifty” hostages had been killed in Israeli strikes in Gaza since October 7. Agence France-Presse was unable to immediately verify this toll.
Israel has been preparing for a ground invasion of Gaza since Hamas fighters launched cross-border attacks in which they took hostages and killed 1,400 people, the majority of them civilians, according to Israeli officials.
In Gaza, more than 7,700 people were killed in retaliatory Israeli strikes on the Strip, including about 3,500 children, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
© 2023 AFP
#Hostage #families #demand #answers #Israel #expands #war #Gaza
2023-10-28 14:21:04
