Each casket was shown with a photo of a body Hamas said it would hand over.

Jerusalem:

The armed wing of Hamas, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, released a video on Saturday of an Israeli hostage held in the Gaza Strip since the Hamas attack of October 2023.

In the undated, three-and-half-minute video that AFP has not been able to verify, Matan Zangauker says in Hebrew that he has been in captivity for more than 420 days and calls for public pressure on the Israeli government to secure the release of all captives held in Gaza.

Zangauker, who was 24 at the time, was taken from Nir Oz kibbutz along with his partner, Ilana Gritzewsky. She was released during a truce last year. 

His mother, Einav Zangauker, has been one of the most prominent figures in Israel calling for the government to negotiate a hostage release deal that would end the war.

Addressing herself to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, she said: “That Matan is still alive today does not mean he will survive the winter or the continuing military pressure. The only way to bring Matan back is with a deal.”

She added: “I demand the following from you, Netanyahu: give full mandate to the negotiating team to bring a comprehensive deal that will bring everyone back. A comprehensive deal that will bring everyone back, even if it means ending the war. No tricks, no excuses.”

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a campaign group for relatives of those abducted to Gaza, said the video was evidence that hostages remained alive and that “the critical need” to secure their release “becomes more urgent with each passing hour”.

“These hostages’ lives hang by a thread,” the group said.

Critics have accused Netanyahu of stalling truce negotiations and prolonging the war to appease his far-right coalition partners. 

There have been large and frequent protests in Israel since the early days of the war calling for the government to negotiate a hostage release deal with Hamas. 

On Saturday night there were again major protests in Tel Aviv, which Einav Zangauker attended, as well as other Israeli cities. 

Palestinian militants kidnapped 251 people during their surprise attack, of whom 96 remain in Gaza including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.

On Saturday, Qatar said “momentum is coming back” for the talks, while a source close to the Hamas delegation told AFP that a new round of negotiations will “most likely” begin in the coming week.

With Cairo and Washington, Doha has been mediating negotiations for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal for more than a year without success.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A former Hamas hostage has lambasted the United Nations and other advocacy groups for their inaction towards the plight of hostages still held in Gaza. During an address outside the United Nations Security Council in New York on November 6, Mia Shem expressed frustration over what she described as the UN’s absence in seeking aid for those in captivity.

“Not a single humanitarian agency saw me or treated me. Where was the Red Cross? Where was the UN demanding that they have access to us?” said Mia Shem, who was released in November 2023.

The 22-year-old Israeli-French dual national detailed her harrowing experience marked by isolation, lack of medical treatment and intimidation by armed captors. She said, “For 50 days, I was kept alone, suffering from an unbearable pain in my hand, without any treatment. A Hamas terrorist sat in front of me in a dark room with a gun pointed at my head. Not a single humanitarian agency saw me or treated me even as my arm got worse.”

Shem also revealed how after her abduction she was held in a Palestinian home, where she endured harassment from an adult and taunts from a child. Speaking to Channel 12, she said, “There are no innocents in Gaza, not even one.”

Israel’s UN Ambassador, Danny Danon, also spoke at the press conference, sharply criticising the UN’s “complete moral failure.” He said the UN’s silence on the issue was “unforgivable.”

According to a report in the New York Post, while the UN Security Council has issued statements urging Hamas to release Israeli hostages, no specific actions or sanctions have been proposed to enforce these demands.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has maintained that, as a neutral humanitarian body, it cannot adopt a strong public stance, although it has expressed a desire to visit Israeli captives.

In over a year-long Israeli onslaught in Gaza, over 43,000 Palestinians — a vast majority of them kids and women — have been killed. Almost the entire population of Gaza has been internally displaced, with people forced to move from one place to another as Israeli rockets target neighbourhoods, hospitals and even camps offering temporary refuge.

The Benjamin Netanyahu government’s war in Gaza came as a retaliation to Hamas’ October 7 attack on a music festival and parts of southern Israel. At least 1200 people were killed in the attack, and Hamas took another 254 people hostage.

Dubai:

The leader of Palestinian group Hamas said on Wednesday that Israeli hostages held in the besieged Gaza Strip were subject to the same “death and destruction” that Palestinians have faced.

Hamas has told mediators that it was necessary for the “massacre” to stop and called on people to continue protesting, particularly in the West, to mount pressure on decision makers, Ismail Haniyeh said in a recorded video message.
 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)