Families of Israeli captives who appeared alive in a video filmed in the Gaza Strip before later being killed have sharply criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with one family member describing him as “despicable.”
On Thursday, Israeli media aired footage reportedly obtained by the Israeli army during its operations in Gaza. The video shows six Israeli captives lighting Hanukkah candles inside a tunnel in the Strip. All six were later killed.
According to the Israeli newspaper The Jerusalem Post, the captives were killed in Gaza in 2024. They were identified as Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hirsch Goldberg-Polin, Uri Danino, Alexander Lobanov, and Almog Sarousi. The newspaper reported that their bodies were recovered in Rafah, southern Gaza, in August of that year.
While The Jerusalem Post did not specify the circumstances of their deaths, former Israeli negotiator Nitzan Alon said on Tuesday that most Israeli captives in Jabaliya, northern Gaza, were killed by Israeli army fire due to what he described as “intelligence gaps,” according to Yedioth Ahronoth.
Public Anger
Reacting to the video, the families of the six captives said in a statement carried by Maariv: “They were kidnapped alive, and they should have been brought back alive. Nothing will bring our loved ones back.”
They added that “revealing the truth and taking responsibility honestly, officially, and genuinely is the only way justice can be served and our hearts can begin to heal.”
Gil Dickman, the cousin of Carmel Gat, wrote on X that “an entire country is crying, grieving, and angry,” criticizing Netanyahu’s response to the video, which he said the prime minister had not even watched.
Dickman wrote: “Look at Carmel. You are a despicable person. How dare you say you brought everyone back?”
In response, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement cited by Channel 12 that “the prime minister’s policy led to the return of all the abductees except for the late Ran Givoli,” a police officer whose remains are still in Gaza, adding that Netanyahu “insists on bringing him back as well.”
‘You Will Not Remain in Power’
Einav Tsengauker, the mother of Matan, who was released from Gaza during the recent exchange deal, wrote on X that she watched the video “with tears that would not stop.”
“They could have been saved. They were alive, and it was the duty of this government to save them,” she wrote, accusing Netanyahu’s government, along with National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, of “deliberately sacrificing them to remain in power for another year.”
“You will not remain in power. The people of Israel will not allow those responsible for this failure and these terrible years to continue as if nothing happened,” she concluded.
It is worth noting that Hamas released all living Israeli captives during the ceasefire agreement that came into effect on October 10, along with the bodies of captives who died while in custody, except for one captive it said it was still searching for.
Israel, meanwhile, continues to condition the implementation of the second phase of the prisoner exchange agreement and the end of the war on Gaza on the return of the body of soldier Ran Givoli according to the Palestine Chronicle.
With US support, Israel’s war on Gaza, launched on October 8, 2023, and lasting two years, has left more than 70,000 Palestinians killed and over 171,000 wounded, most of them women and children.
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