The IOF’s recovery of six dead Israeli captives in Gaza has prompted a furious reaction among Israelis. Demonstrators lashed out at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for failing to secure a cease-fire deal that would have paved the way for the release of the captives, and accused him of abandoning captives and stalling on a ceasefire deal for his political gain.
During a news conference in Jerusalem on September 4, the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, falsely claimed that Hamas started releasing captives after the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) entered Rafah and Philadelphi Corridor back in May. However, there has been no hostage deal between Israel and Hamas since November, several months before Israel invaded Rafah. Since then, Israel has released some hostages through intense rescue operations following the Rafah invasion.
Netanyahu Alleged That Hamas Began Releasing Hostages After Invading Rafah
Speaking at a press conference for foreign press, regarding the importance of Israel remaining in the Philadelphi Corridor, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu falsely claimed that Hamas began giving back Israeli hostages after the IOF invaded Rafah.
“You know when they started giving us hostages? When we went into Philadelphi when we went into Rafah when we controlled the Rafah crossing. That’s when they felt the pressure” Benjamin Netanyahu said.
“If we leave Rafah, if we leave the Philadelphi Corridor, there won’t be any pressure. We won’t get the hostages,” Netanyahu asserted.
Contrary to Netanyahu’s claim, there has been no hostage deal since November. Israel and Hamas exchanged hostages during the truce in November, several months before Israel invaded Rafah. Since then, Israel has released some hostages through intense rescue operations following the Rafah invasion.
In October, Hamas released two U.S. citizens – Judith Raanan, and her daughter, Natalie Raanan. Later two Israeli women were released – Nurit Cooper, and Yocheved Lifshitz. In late October, Private Ori Megidish was freed during a ground operation by Israeli forces. By the end of a six-day truce on November 30, 105 captives had been released by Hamas and 240 Palestinian prisoners had been freed by Israel.
On February 12, the Israeli Occupation forces carried out massive air strikes on the southern Gaza city of Rafah and rescued two Israeli hostages in a complex overnight operation. The two Israeli captives were identified as Fernando Simon Marman and Louis Har. The Israeli mission under heavy air strikes killed around 100 people in Rafah, according to the Palestinian health ministry. Later in June, the IOF rescued four hostages from the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, where, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, a bloody Israeli assault took place, killing at least 210 people and wounding more than 400 others.
On September 1, the IOF announced the recovery of the bodies of six hostages from a tunnel beneath Rafah.
Netanyahu claimed that Hamas began giving back Israeli hostages after the IOF invaded Rafah, however, the captives have been released through diplomatic negotiations and during a brief truce or rescued through intense military operations. And Israel’s military operations have led to the deaths of some captives.
Israel Recovers Bodies of Six Captives Held in Gaza
On September 1, the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF), said in a statement on the X platform, that the bodies of six hostages, including an American citizen, held by Hamas had been recovered in the Rafah area of the Gaza Strip.
The bodies were located on Saturday in an underground tunnel, the IOF said.
"They were all taken hostage on Oct. 7 and were murdered by the Hamas terrorist organization while in captivity in Gaza," the IOF added.
The Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF), claimed that Hamas killed the six hostages as the IOF troops were approaching the tunnel in Rafah where they were located.
The IOF named the victims Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi, Master Sergeant Ori Danino, and the Israeli American Hersh Goldberg-Polin.
“A few hours ago, we informed the families that the bodies of their loved ones had been located by IDF troops in an underground tunnel in Rafah. According to our initial assessment, they were brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists shortly before we reached them,” IOF spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said.
The Israeli newspaper, The Times Of Israel claimed that the hostages were killed 48 to 72 hours before the autopsy, meaning between Thursday and Friday morning, according to the Israeli health ministry.
Netanyahu Denies Responsibility for Israeli Hostages' Death
After the IOF reported finding the bodies of six hostages in Gaza, Israel's prime minister denied responsibility for the deaths of six Israeli hostages whose bodies were recently recovered in the southern Gaza Strip.
"Israel will not rest until it catches those responsible for the murdering of six hostages," Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement.
Netanyahu claimed that Hamas was "obstructing" efforts to secure the release of remaining hostages and undermining Israel's security, adding that Israel "was committed to achieving a deal to release remaining hostages and ensure Israel's security."
“Those who kill hostages do not want an agreement” for a Gaza truce, Netanyahu said.
Hamas Blames Israel for the Death of the Six Hostages in Rafah
A senior Hamas official stated that the six Israeli hostages recently found in Gaza were killed as a result of ongoing Israeli airstrikes, challenging the Israeli army's claim that Hamas executed the hostages while they were in captivity, Anadolu Agency reports.
Izzat Al-Rishq, a member of Hamas's political bureau, remarks came shortly after the Israeli army announced that it had discovered the bodies of six hostages in Gaza, asserting that they had been killed by Hamas.
“The ones who kill our people daily are the Israeli colonizers with American weapons. The hostages found in Gaza were not killed by us but by the relentless Zionist bombardment,” Rishq said in a statement.
Rishq emphasized that Hamas had been more concerned about the lives of the hostages than Biden himself, citing Hamas’ agreement to a cease-fire proposal and the U.N. Security Council’s resolution, both of which were rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“Netanyahu's statements are the speech of a desperate person who is looking for an imaginary victory that he has not succeeded in marketing to his audience after 10 months of his Nazi war against our people in the Gaza Strip,” Al-Rishq said.
He added that any delay in his “approval and commitment to what was reached on July 7 (in a cease-fire proposal) means putting the lives of more prisoners at risk,” referring to the recent deaths of six Israeli captives in Gaza, saying "Netanyahu bears responsibility for the lives and safety of the prisoners held by the resistance.”
Furthermore, the senior Hamas official and chief negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, has denied Israeli claims that the hostages had been executed saying that some of these prisoners were killed directly by Israeli forces, either through airstrikes or live fire.
Netanyahu Manipulated the U.S.-Backed Hostage Deal Outline
On September 3, the Israeli news site, Ynet published a Copy of the amended hostage release-ceasefire deal proposal submitted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on July 27. The published material, which includes maps and lists of names of hostages, spell out the differences between the May 27 Israeli proposal revealed by U.S. President Joe Biden and the changes made by Netanyahu two months later, including the demand for a permanent Israeli presence along the Philadelphi Corridor. According to an Israeli senior security official, the Prime Minister's "turning back" step, completely changed the picture of the negotiations, and turned it into a "bloody document stained with the blood of the six abductees who were murdered in the tunnel in Rafah", Ynet added.
On July 7, Netanyahu presented Israel’s hostage negotiating team with a list of what he said were four nonnegotiable demands that must be met for Israel to move ahead with the U.S.-backed proposal. Included among the demands was the stipulation that Israel must remain in control of the Philadelphi Corridor, the Netzarim Corridor and the Rafah border crossing.
While Netanyahu has continued to insist that he did not add anything to the hostage deal proposal, the stipulation did not feature in the May 27 proposal, but, according to Ynet, is present in the amended version, known as the “clarification document” dubbed later as the “Netanyahu Outline.”
The May 27 proposal states that by the seventh day of the first phase of the deal, Israeli forces will completely withdraw from urban areas in the Gaza Strip the commencement of return of internally displaced to their place of residence (without carrying arms while returning), the freedom of movement of the population in all areas of the Gaza strip. It further adds that by the 22nd day of the 42-day initial phase, Israeli forces must “withdraw from the central Gaza strip.”
In contrast, the Netanyahu Outline presented a significantly shorter explanation as to how Israeli troops will withdraw in the event of a ceasefire.
According to Ynet, it stated that “the redeployment of the IDF troops will be carried out by the attached maps.” Two of the attached maps were unchanged from those presented as part of the May 27 proposal, Ynet reported, but the third was new. It showed that while the Israeli presence would be reduced along the Philadelphi Corridor, troops would not entirely withdraw, even though Hamas has continued to insist that it will tolerate nothing less than a full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the border route.
As for the checkpoints for displaced Gazans returning home, the July 27 document drawn up by Netanyahu and the May 27 outline stated that Gazan civilians returning to their homes were required to be unarmed. However, while the original proposal had removed the stipulation that civilians must be checked for weapons before being allowed past a certain point, with approval from the IOF, the Netanyahu Outline added it back in.
Regarding the release of hostages in exchange for Palestinians, in the U.S.-backed hostage release outline, it was stated that during the first
phase, “Hamas shall release 33 of the Israeli hostages, who are women (civilians and soldiers), children (under 19 years who are not soldiers), elderly (above 50 years) and ill and wounded civilians, in exchange for several Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons and detention centers.” While the classification of humanitarian hostages remained the same in Netanyahu’s outline, he drew up a list naming the 33 hostages whom Israel expected to be released.
A document published by Ynet indicated that three of the six captives that have been recovered from Rafah had been slated for release during the first phase of a potential deal.
According to Ynet, an unnamed official alleged that Netanyahu likely knew that issuing a list of hostages before the deal was even signed would delay negotiations.
“If it weren’t for the intentional sabotage within this document, intended to prevent a deal, there is a good chance that they would have been released last month and would be here with us, alive,” the unnamed Israeli official added.
It is noteworthy to mention that Hamas has stressed that they already agreed to a hostage exchange deal on 2 July. That had been proposed by the U.S. and agreed to by Israel. However, once Hamas declared its agreement, Netanyahu proceeded to change his position and add a battery of conditions designed to scupper the signing of the agreement.
As soon as news of the discovery of six dead captives was released, the Israeli hostages' families exploded in rage against Netanyahu and called for mass protests.
Massive Anti-Netanyahu Protests Take Place Across Israel
Thousands of Israelis have taken to the streets to urge a hostage deal, after the IOF announced on September 1, that it had recovered the bodies of six captives from Gaza. The protests erupted over Netanyahu’s policy of using the military rather than negotiations to recover the captives, and blamed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for his handling of the crisis, saying he had not done enough to secure a hostage-ceasefire deal.
The Hostages Families Forum said on Tuesday evening that the publication of the so-called Netanyahu Outline meant that the premier could “no longer claim that he is not torpedoing or thwarting the deal.”
The document is “another nail in the coffin for the deal that would return the hostages,” it continued. “Enough with the deception and the abandonment. Enough about lying to the public and enough with the spins about philadelphi. For how long will the hostages be murdered in captivity while Netanyahu plays with maps and public opinion?”
The Hostages and Missing Family Forum accused the premier of faking his support and challenged his commitment to secure the release of their loved ones. They called on Netanyahu to cease wearing the yellow ribbon pin used to show solidarity with the hostages.
They stated that the yellow ribbon pin symbolizes support for the return of hostages and solidarity with their families and that they urge the prime minister to remember that the pin is worn globally in the hope of a swift resolution for the 101 hostages. The Hostages and Missing Family Forum demanded he stop wearing the pin as a superficial gesture when he was not adequately addressing their return.
Furthermore, Israel’s public broadcaster, Kan, reported that the families held a news conference, accusing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of abandoning their loved ones.
“Prime Minister, you have abandoned our sons. If you won’t bring them back, we will make sure to do so ourselves. The neglect must end, here and now,” they said.
Poll: 61% of Israelis Do Not Trust Netanyahu
According to an opinion poll conducted by the Kantar Institute online on 4 September, which included 600 people aged 18 and over, sixty-one percent of Israelis do not trust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s management of the war on the besieged Gaza Strip; nor his ability to form a cabinet if early elections are held.
According to the poll, if early elections are held, Netanyahu’s Party "Likud" will win only 22 seats in the Knesset while the National Camp Party, headed by Benny Gantz, will win 23.
The poll showed that 53% of Israelis support withdrawing from the Philadelphi Corridor to reach a prisoner exchange deal with Hamas, while 29 percent of respondents believe Israeli occupation forces should remain in the Philadelphi Corridor even if this leads to the failure of the deal. Eighteen percent of the participants said they were “undecided” about the issue.
When asked about Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, half of the respondents said they do not trust him to manage the war compared to 37% who said they do.
When asked who they preferred to head the next government, 37% of respondents said Gantz got their vote, while support for Netanyahu fell to 30 percent compared to 36% in the previous poll conducted in August 22.
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