Do you pray for the hostages too?

Yes. I pray for the 110 or so israeli and immgrant hostages assumed to still be alive. And I also pray for the hundreds of Palestianian hostages arrested without charge in Israeli prisons assumed to be alive.

I pray for a ceasefire so that the Israeli hostages are released. I also pray for the end of Israeli apartheid government, so that Palestianians are liberated.

Daily update post:

So, according to the hostage release deal, for Hamas to get an extension of the break in fighting, it would have to pass to Israel a list of at least 10 hostages it would release on that day until 7 in the morning at the latest, or by that point, the deal would be considered over and the IDF would resume fighting. Yesterday's list was passed to Israel at 6:40 in the morning, and was problematic (more on this later in the post), but Israel accepted the list, and the break continued. This morning, Hamas didn't pass a list (at least not one that sticks to the deal, naming at least 10 living women and kids), and on top of that, it fired rockets at Israeli civilians again, at 5:45 in the morning, over an hour before the break would be over. This is a part of what we mean when we tell you that Hamas has broken every ceasefire ever.

Regarding the terrorist attack in Jerusalem yesterday, the 24 years old woman who was murdered, Livia Dikman, was an only daughter, and pregnant with her first child. I want you to understand that there are entire families that Hamas has erased in the past, on Oct 7, and continues to do so since that massacre, too. A 38 years old man called Yuval Doron Kastelman died of his wounds, raising the number of civilians murdered in this terrorist attack to 4, 5 if you count the unborn baby (and I personally don't see a reason not to. That's another life that was taken). Hamas has officially taken responsibility for this attack. Reminder, that this was while the break in fighting was still on. This is another part of why we point out that Hamas has broken every ceasefire ever.

This is Yuval:

I mentioned there was an issue with the list passed by Hamas to Israel yesterday. The number of hostages on it was 8. The day before, Hamas released 12 people, 2 of which were elderly women with a Russian citizenship, that Hamas said it was releasing outside of the hostage deal, as a tribute to Putin, thanking him for his support of Hamas. They insisted that these two Israelis be released separately, that they be released to Russian representatives, not to Israeli ones (making the arrival of these two elderly women to an Israeli hospital longer), and the Kremlin released an announcement thanking Hamas for the gesture... a day later, suddenly Hamas said that these two actually do count as a part of the deal, meaning that Israel must release convicted terrorists in exchange for these two women's freedom, and because the day before Hamas let 12 hostages go instead of 10, they claimed that on the following day it was enough that they released just 8. This is after they originally were only offering 5 living hostages and 3 bodies, a list that Israel rejected, and insisted on getting living hostages, or the deal would be considered broken, and the fighting would resume. After Hamas switched to 8 living hostages at the last minute, Israel relented on the two women, counted them as a part of the deal, and released 6 convicted terrorists for them. But according to one journalist, the deal specifically said that Hamas would only get one additional day without fighting if it released at least 10 hostages on that day. So whether as a tribute to Putin or not, the list of 8 hostages was another violation of the deal, which Israel was willing to "swallow" in order to get those 8 hostages released.

The IDF has published a map to help Gazans evacuate the area designated for fighting. Reports say many are already following it.

There was an explosion in Yemen the other day, reportedly someone attacked a warehouse with weapons, belonging to the Houthis, the same Iran-funded terrorist organization that has declared war on Israel alongside Hamas, and has been firing at the southern Israeli city of Eilat, and attacking Israeli ships (or ships claimed to be Israeli).

This is Mia Shem as seen in a vid released by Hamas, where she was made to say that she was getting good medical treatment:

Mia's hand was badly injured when she was attacked and kidnapped by Hamas. She was in need of an operation. After her release, she recounted that the man who operated her arm was a vet. Because I guess to Hamas, Jews are animals? Like several other hostages, she will need further medical treatment, in the hope that the damage caused by Hamas can be reversed, or at least minimized.

These are 17 years old Or Yaakov, and his brother Yagil, who was 12 years old at the time of his kidnapping (he turned 13 in captivity).

Yesterday, their uncle revealed that Hamas terrorists drugged these boys every time they were moved from one location to another, and that they were also physically branded. Before being placed on the motorcycle used to move them between locations, their legs were shoved up against the scorching metal of the exhaust pipe, causing a burn that would help them be identified in case they escaped. If you're Jewish, there's a good chance that at this point, you're thinking about how the Nazis branded Jews with the number tattoos.

This is 17 years old Mia Leimberg.

Anti-Israel activists used her image, being freed from Hamas captivity with her dog, to claim that this shows how well the Israeli hostages were treated. It turns out that during her abduction, Mia wouldn't let go of her dog, after she had seen other dogs being shot by Hamas. The dog stayed so quiet and motionless in Mia's arms, that the terrorists thought it was a doll. When they discovered the truth in Gaza, they wanted to take the dog away from her, but Mia wouldn't let them. The terrorists made it clear they were not going to waste food on a dog, so for over 50 days in captivity, Mia shared the little food she got from Hamas with her dog, and they both had to survive on what wasn't enough food for one human. This image isn't a testament to Hamas' humanity. It's a testament to Mia's.

This is 29 years old Shani Goren.

She was released yesterday. Earlier, 12 years old Eitan Yahalomi was freed, and he mentioned that, when he wasn't kept in isolation, he was with Shani, who chose to pass on some of the small food portion she got with him. And yes, it reminded me of countless testimonies from the Holocaust, of people recounting how even at the worst of times, they shared food with each other, in accordance with humane Jewish values, helping each other survive rather than focusing on just their own survival.

Israeli police has opened an investigative case for each released hostage, with their testimonies, and evidence regarding them, as a part of building the legal case against Hamas, for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

I wanna address the attempt to create a false equivalence between Hamas' brutality towards the Israeli hostages, and how Israel treats Palestinian prisoners. For the record, Israel CAN'T physically abuse its prisoners, as was claimed, because they're constantly supervised. Unlike the Israeli hostages, Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails regularly get visits from the International Red Cross, from their lawyers, from family members, from social workers, from public defenders, if they're teenagers, then from juvenile court judges, too. There's a whole system put in place to make sure their rights are preserved. And of course, they can always sue Israel for wrongdoing.

But specifically, what happened the other day is that one of the released convicted terrorists couldn't just thank his luck that he got to walk away without serving the full sentence for his crimes, he decided to vilify Israel by claiming both his hands were broken while he was still in prison (middle pic).

He gave countless interviews with both his hands bandaged. Trouble for him is that there's footage of him on the day of his release, not only without bandages and looking fine, he's actually using his hands quite freely.

But in the visuals of him leaving Ofer prison and being transferred to a Red Cross vehicle, Nazzal is seen using one his hands to hold onto the railing as he boarded the van. He is also seen placing his hand in his pocket.

Before Hamas broke and ended the hostage deal, its leader in Gaza, the man considered the mastermind behind the massacre, Yahya Sinwar, gave his first statement since Oct 7. He said clearly that the massacre was just a dress rehearsal. If you want Israel to stop the war without Hamas' complete and total surrender, while that terrorist organization can still make good on its threats, that is what you are consenting to.

Since the release of the hostages, and probably at least partly based on info provided by them, several of the kidnapped hostages have been declared murdered. Among them is Aviv, the husband of my colleague Liat, who was herself released just the other day.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

On ceasefire negotiations related to how Israel-Hamas is operating. Israel demanded to know how many hostages remain and who is alive, and apparently Hamas is refusing to provide the names and count. Is this a normal thing to argue over and is it normal for a country to sacrifice military campaigns for a comparatively small number of civilians? For example would the United States act similarly if it were in Israel's situation? Would another Western country?

This is actually something I can talk a great deal about, because it deals with negotiations, game theory, and applying economic concepts to non-economic subjects. This will be pretty clinically heartless, so I'm going to throw a cut down.

A hostage negotiation is, at its core, taking prisoners to extract some form of compensation for their safe return. The hostage taker wants something, and trades in human lives to get it. This can be money (ransom), an exchange of prisoners (a prisoner swap), or to exert pressure to enact political change (terrorism). The negotiation is largely an argument over price - how much is it worth to return the hostages safely. We'll get back to this in a bit.

It is typically standard practice to declare the name, number, and status of hostages for a few reasons. One is verification, to prove that the organization has the hostages in question. The second is to establish good faith that the negotiations can be conducted, that the hostages won't be immediately executed. If there is no good faith, the other side does not negotiate and instead attempts rescue (or in Russia's case, just mows them down indiscriminately). That's the same reason why hostage takers can release hostages as a show of good faith that further negotiations are fruitful.

At the end of the day, a hostage negotiation is an argument over the price of the hostages' lives. In any negotiation, information asymmetry is the name of the day, and the more advantages you have in that category, the better price you can command. Hamas is incentivized not to declare the name and status of the hostages for both benign (relatively) and malign reasons. By refusing to name the number and status of the hostages, it forces uncertainty into the Israeli negotiations. If Israel doesn't know how many hostages it's "buying" then it's liable to offer more than Hamas is willing to settle for, which makes Hamas come out ahead in the exchange. If Israel offers too low an amount, Hamas can simply demand more - there are no downsides unless Israel refuses to negotiate.

Of course, the malign reason is that the hostages are not in the best shape - they're either the victims of torture or are already dead. In this case, Hamas is disguising the status to up the price of the negotiations. Typically, negotiators don't pay for dead hostages, so in the event you have dead hostages, it's advantageous to disguise that status to extract something for them (typically money because once you have it in your hand, it's tough to go backsies). It's not good business in the long run, because no one does business with you again, but Hamas likely doesn't believe it's going to be in a position to negotiate again so that threat is less prescient. Similarly, Hamas likely believes it's insulated from the inevitable blowback that it would bring. Support for Hamas, either from their Iranian backers or Western groups, doesn't typically go down even in response to perfidy, torture, or other crimes. So in that sense, being a habitual bad-faith actor doesn't hold the same animus - they're still going to enjoy support from their backers regardless of what they do, which are prime conditions for reinforcing bad behavior. It's similar in Israel, where the Netanyahu government largely doesn't care about foreign political pressure - their reaction typically to international condemnation is to close ranks and accuse their critics of wanting them dead, or at least not caring whether they live or die.

Typically, governments don't like to negotiate ransoms for hostage taking for the all-too-logical reason, it incentivizes other hostage taking attempts. Private citizens often pay ransoms because for them, it is a singular iteration of game theory - there typically isn't a second instance of hostage taking unless the individual is quite unlucky. Governments however, frequently interact with terror groups and are thus less likely to negotiate directly save in the event that the hostage in question is extremely important.

In that sense, hostage taking is usually an attempt to force private citizens to enact domestic pressure on a government, not to pressure the government directly. In the sense of the United States or any other Western countries, this is more effective than in autocracies such as Russia or China, which both are relatively resistant to domestic criticism and are more willing to accept civilian casualties. So to answer your question of what would the United States or another Western nation do, the answer is "it depends on the willingness of the public to place domestic pressure on the government to free the hostages versus their desire to punish the perpetrators."

Thanks for the question, Cle-Guy.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

so.... the whole Palestine situation has been going on for a while and it's about time I did something about it, especially since the whole strike thing is about to end soon. (though that doesn't mean you should stop posting about / supporting Palestine by any means)

Will probably do more art and posts about this later but for now here's some links that I hope will help with this whole situation.

(20) ⸝⸝ ꒰୨୧ Stella🌸! ₊⊹꒱ on X: "THREADS , PETITIONS , & MORE TO HELP PALESTINE 🇵🇸🍉 !! https://t.co/ODVRQ6yQ1A" / X (twitter.com)

(20) 🇧🇷🇵🇸Lizard/Allie¡•📌RECIPES!!��🍉 on X: "YOU 🫵 MINOR WHO WANTS TO SUPPORT PALESTINE 🫵🇵🇸🍉 HERE'S SOME WAYS YOU CAN HELP EVEN HAVING ISR*EL SUPPORTER PARENTS (just like me unfortunately) A small🧵" / X (twitter.com)

(20) qt 🍉 on X: ""hamas" had already offered a choice to actually end the "war" by releasing the hostages with permanent ceasefire as exchange. isnotrael said no, they dont really give two bitches and a flying cooch about hostages at all, and now theyre using a nuke #CeasefireNOW #FreePalestine" / X (twitter.com)

(20) Lone Sheep Akito Shinonome on X: "“Israel is defending itself.” Self-defense isn���t killing children. Self-defense it’s using WHITE PHOSPHORUS on innocent civilians. GENOCIDE ISN’T SELFxDEFENSE. Stop using the self-defense excuse and open your eyes. This is genocide." / X (twitter.com)

Please spread this around, the only way things are going to get better is if we act, and if you don't know much about this whole situation, please educate yourself.

If I came across as snippy or trying to start something, I apologize, I'm barely holding myself together right now. I just saw some of the comments people have made about the situation on your Palestine AU and got frustrated. I want to be sure people have the whole picture, but whenever I try, people shut me down without really listening and blocking me. A guy got my original account deleted for "hate speech" when I posted my story just because they didn't like what I said. That's why I'm staying anon.

The truth is, I have someone over there who's being held in the middle of it all. She went on a school trip a few months ago and was reported missing. My family panicked not knowing what happened, and then a few weeks later all hell broke loose with this war.

My family was furious with Israel, and jumped to the conclusion it was like Russia & Ukraine, but later found out they were trying to take out Hamas, who had taken her and some of her classmates hostage.

No one knows what it's like to have someone over there, and no one seems to try to understand or even care. In their minds, Israel is the big bully and Palestine is the sole victim, but things aren't that black and white. Hell, Israel negotiating for hostage releases is the only reason a couple of her classmates have come home.

Meanwhile, everyone online seems to keep preaching about how Palestine must be free and how they need to stop supporting this war while offering no real alternatives to stopping Hamas, even going so far as to say they are a bunch of freedom fighters who need the support. Sometimes the only options you have are bad ones... But you still have to choose...

I'm not saying what's happening to the innocent people in Palestine isn't a tragedy, or trying to just brush it off, but men who kill without reason cannot be reasoned with. I wouldn't wish this on anyone; knowing those monsters have her is a living hell, and not a day goes by that we don't hope and pray that they'll be stopped, just so my sister can come home.

Sorry for rambling, I just really needed that release. I've said my peace, I promise I won't bother you about it again.

Hey, I completely understand your situation. But we have to admit this is a sensitive topic for many. NOT forbidden, just sensitive. You can expect me to listen to what you have to say and even understand your perspective, but you won't find many people like that when it comes to this topic and that is just what the internet is like. Just because I am understanding you doesn't mean other people are, and they each have their own right to being exhausted with justifications of crimes on any side. If there's anything I've learned it's that pointing fingers in an argument is not going to get anyone anywhere. I am someone who has been trying to hear out both israelis and Palestinians because like anyone else, after oct 7 I wanted to get the whole picture, as you say.

But your entire discussion started with being biased instead of trying to show the whole situation. You started with saying "israel is not the bad guy" but also said "Hamas is a terrorist organization" and I want you to really look at the use of words if you want people to see the "entire picture". Otherwise you ARE going to get shut down. The entire point of starting an argument online is that you first have to claim you've tried to study the complexity thoroughly. Chalking it up to Hamas being a terrorist organization and justifying a genocide is not going to cut that.

I am completely against trying to shut down someone's grief no matter how big or small it is. Everything comes down to the fact that we are all human, we all have feelings and every life matters. I can only send my condolences to the family that's going through this first hand. First of all, if you are actually someone who has been so closely impacted by this, trying to show the 'bigger picture' on the other accounts instead of your own is ALREADY a pretty dangerous thing for you to do, let alone to the art account of a local tribal artist in the north of some little country.

Now I really want you to evaluate your situation. Your family is tensed, is grieving, they are beside themselves with worry. Just thinking about it makes me sad and I sincerely hope that everything safely gets resolved for you and hopefully everyone is safe. But can you seriously say that as soon as your family found out "oh, Israel is just trying to eradicate a terrorist organization by blowing up the very place where the hostages could potentially be" they were…. okay with it?

I understand what it's like. I understand and I care. I grew UP on the stories of people going missing, people being blown up, people getting martyred in Palestine. Trust me I understand what you are going through.

I will never try to justify what happened to civilians on oct 7. it is horrible. What happened on oct 7 and what has been happening in Palestine for years makes no one but the innocent suffer at the hands of evil powers. But you cannot, with all due respect, try to say you're showing a 'bigger picture' when you clearly failed to mention the entire history.

Everyone living in Israel knows they are, first and foremost, living in an apartheid state. It is not that difficult for anyone mature enough to see the situation around them and look up and research to come to that conclusion. And many Israelis have. And many have left. Because they knew what living being such a place will entail for them.

And keep in mind I am also NOT in support of trying to make any Israelis leave, who have documented proof of any of their ancestors being from that land and/or don't have second citizenship somewhere else in the world. I hold them to the same level of rights as I do Palestinians.

I don't need to get into overcomplicated finger-pointing and yelling. You can look up Israeli soldiers shooting their own hostages in Gaza despite them shouting in Hebrew and holding up white flags. And the army only apologized because they were identified as Israeli citizens. How does that differentiate the Israeli army from Hamas? I don't need to pull up multiple sources or proof provided by the Israelis themselves. They are already everywhere. What I've heard and what I've seen from October seven, I'm seeing more and more of it being done by the Israeli Army. So we need to be really careful trying to call one side a terrorist, because that will automatically mean calling the other side the same. Which is true. In terms of definitions, what's happening in Gaza is blatant terrorism.

If Palestine was an apartheid state, you would see me speaking out against them. If Palestine was a colonizer apartheid and the people stood up to fight back against a powerful army with resources far more than that of them, you would see me calling them freedom fighters, not terrorists. Because I did happen to read a little bit about the international laws. I do happen to be from a family with a history of armed freedom fighters.

So yes, I am incredibly sorry that this is impacting you mentally, I hope you and you family stays safe and united, but if the impact is making you say biased things, it's better to go offline, take a break from social media, and spend this time trying to pray for your family and spending time with them.

hamas is trying to return the hostages in exchange for Israel pulling back and Netanyahu refused. It's pretty clear this is just a pretense for genocide. What will it take for you to see that? Because this whole time people have been saying "just return the hostages" (as though civilians have any control over that) but as soon as Hamas offers to make these terms, Israel backs off. You fell for their propaganda. It was always a lie.

It's interesting to see what sliver of information is selected for the information war.

Hamas's demands were actually:

-complete withdrawal of IDF troops from Gaza -unconditional release of all Hamas prisoners, thousands at this point, including those identified as being part of the Oct. 7th attacks -acknowledgement that Hamas will remain in power -Hamas will in return release the hostages... at least the ones it has... who are not identified, its not clear if they are dead or alive. It's already known that a large number are actually held by PIJ or by individual Gazan men who followed the pogrom on Oct. 7. Their fate would not be guaranteed.

Israel has lately counter-offered, in rather confusing separate offers:

-return all the hostages for a 2 month ceasefire -an exchange of prisoners in return for IDF withdrawal from key area in northern Gaza -fuck everything we're just going to take over Gaza again

The threat to occupy Gaza is something I completely oppose. I think good fences make good neighbors. Israel should have as little to do with Gaza and the West Bank as possible. Of course, Netanyahu also doubled down and rejected a two state solution. If anyone's asking, Hamas also rejects the 2 state solution, by the way. It's ridiculous. Israel did attempt to get several Arab neighboring states to setup an administration of Gaza, which they all unhelpfully (but sensibly in political terms) rejected. A broader international coalition was also rejected - not that they could even find anyone willing to take it on. I can see the dilemma of trying to remove Hamas and find someone less terroristy to govern, but I don't think Israel should step in. And fuck all the 'ceasefire' nonsense - can we force both sides to start an actual peace and declare an independent state of Palestine next to the state of Israel- you have people, you have land, stop fighting and create a paradise on the sea! Not that anyone is asking me...

Anyway, Saudi has said they won't sign their peace treaty with Israel without a plan for a Palestine state, U.S. is adding pressure too, we will see what offers will fly back and forth in the weeks to come. The good news is that the bullshit demands and declarations seem to be face-saving motions that might actually represent a genuine desire on both sides to stop this particular war at least, and I welcome that.

"We must support the establishment of a single, democratic, secular state in all of historic Palestine"."Listen to Mokhiber's chilling words. Yes, Israel is engaged in an existential fight. At the U.N., there are human rights for everyone but Jews, who are supposed to lay down their arms in the face of a genocidal enemy currently enslaving their people. Mokhiber's phony ‘human rights’ cover is extremely disturbing. He says equality means 21 Arab states, 56 Islamic states and zero Jewish states.

you are so fucking stupid and i can tell this is coming from a place of deep rooted islamophobia. you are equating israel with judaism & equating arabs/muslims (which arent interchangeable) with "the enemy" without any ifs and buts, even though in the last few weeks countless people have explained why that is incorrect.

who is the genocidal enemy currently enslaving whose people? from what i've seen hamas has already released several israeli hostages, all of whom have shared their account of what happened and all of whom made a point to highlight the humanity they were treated with. hamas has offered to release all of the hostages, and israel has refused to accept them. meanwhile, israel has been detaining hundreds and hundreds of palestinians unprovoked, many of whom die without ever being freed. just the in the last few days israel has picked off palestinian civilians off the streets in the west bank. who is enslaving who? just yesterday israel killed more than 400 palestinian civilians in one go. who is committing genocide against who?

and to address your arab states and islamic states—not a single one of those states forbids a person of another faith from living amongst them. you people have such a problem with iran existing and having the sway that it does in the middle east, and even in iran there are non muslims living a normal life. in all of these arab and islamic countries, there are christians and bahá'í and hindus and sikhs and kurds and jews and people from so many other faiths. none of those countries is an ethnostate, which is what israel wants to be.

youre not going to come to me and cry about the UN not advocating for human rights for jews (which in this case means israel) when all they have fucking done is back israel instead of intervening with a stern hand to stop the annihilation of an entire people. maybe because the executive director of the united nations children's fund is married to the chairman of the blackrock investment. which is the largest fund manager for cluster munitions. as in... cluster bombs... which israel is known to use... but yeah sure the un is so totally not at all fully standing behind israel. stupid fuck

GAZA/JERUSALEM, Nov 28 (Reuters) - Israeli forces and Hamas fighters held their fire beyond the original deadline of a truce on Tuesday, extended at the last minute by at least two days to let more hostages go free.

With both sides expressing hope of further extensions, mediator Qatar hosted the spy chiefs from Israel's Mossad and the U.S. CIA at a meeting to "build on progress", a source briefed on the visits told Reuters.

A single column of black smoke could be seen rising above the obliterated wasteland of the northern Gaza war zone from across the fence in Israel, but for a fifth day there was no sign of jets in the sky or rumble of explosions.

Both sides reported some Israeli tank fire in the Sheikh Radwan district of Gaza City in the morning, but there were no reports of casualties. Israel said its troops had been approached and fired a warning shot.

Previously during the truce, Hamas fighters released 50 Israeli women and children, some of them toddlers, from among the 240 hostages they captured in southern Israel during a deadly rampage on Oct. 7. In return, Israel released 150 security detainees from its jails, all women and teenagers.

Hamas also released 19 foreign hostages, mainly Thai farmworkers, under separate deals parallel to the truce agreement.

Israel has said the truce could be prolonged as long as Hamas continues to release at least 10 hostages per day. But with fewer women and children left in captivity, keeping the guns quiet beyond Wednesday could require negotiating to free at least some Israeli men for the first time.

"We hope the occupation (Israel) abides (by the agreement) in the next two days because we are seeking a new agreement, besides women and children, whereby other categories that we have that we can swap," Hamas official Khalil Al-Hayya told Al Jazeera late on Monday.

Israeli security cabinet minister Gideon Saar told Army Radio that the two-day extension had been agreed under the terms of the original offer, and Israel remained willing to extend the truce further if more hostages were released.

"Immediately upon the completion of the hostage-recovery framework, the warfighting will be renewed," he said.

Qatar's foreign ministry said it was now trying to secure a further extension based on Hamas releasing more hostages.

FIRST RESPITE

The truce brought the first respite to the Gaza Strip in seven weeks, during which Israel had bombed swathes of the territory into a desolate moonscape.

Many Gazans used the opportunity to return to abandoned or destroyed homes, like Abu Shamaleh, who was picking through the rubble of his flattened home in Khan Younis, looking for anything recoverable in the masonry. He said 37 family members had been killed.

"Today I have nothing in this world but memories. Everything is gone," he said. There was no machinery to excavate the body of a cousin still buried in the ruins, he said. "The truce is the time to lift the rubble and search for all the missing people and bury them. We honour the dead by burying them."

Among Israeli hostages yet to be freed was ten-month-old baby Kfir Bibas, along with his brother Ariel, 4, and their parents Yarden and Shiri, bundled from a kibbutz by gunmen on Oct 7. Yarden's sister told reporters relatives had learned the family would not be in the group to go free on Tuesday. Israeli officials said they believed they were being held by a militant group other than Hamas.

"Kfir is only 10 months old. He is a child who still doesn't even know how to say 'Mommy'," Jimmy Miller, a cousin, told Channel 12 TV. "We in the family are not managing to function... The family hasn't slept for a long, long time already - 51 days."

Israel has sworn to annihilate Hamas, the militant group that rules Gaza, after its gunmen burst across the fence and went on a violent spree, killing around 1,200 people and seizing 240 captives.

Since then, Gaza health authorities deemed reliable by the United Nations say more than 15,000 people have been confirmed killed in Israel's bombardment, around 40% of them children, with many more dead feared to be lost under rubble.

More than two-thirds of Gaza's 2.3 million people have lost their homes, with thousands of families sleeping rough in makeshift shelters with only the belongings they could carry.

When the war resumes, Israel has made clear it intends to press on with its assault from the northern half of Gaza into the south. U.S. officials said they have told their ally to be more careful protecting civilians as its forces press on.

"You cannot have the sort of scale of displacement that took place in the north replicated in the south. It will be beyond disruptive, it will be beyond the capacity of any humanitarian support network," one U.S. official said in a call with reporters. "It can't happen."

Despite releasing 150 detainees under the truce, Israel has been arresting Palestinians far faster than it lets them go: according to the Palestinian Prisoners' Club, a semi-official organisation, 3,290 Palestinians have been detained since Oct. 7.

Israel added an additional 50 Palestinian women to its list of 300 detainees cleared for release under the truce, seen as a sign it was prepared to negotiate for more hostages to go free under further extensions.

Israel's siege has led to the collapse of Gaza's health care system, especially in the northern half of the territory where no hospitals remain functioning. The World Health Organization said more Gazans could soon be dying of disease than from bombing.

There were already a very high number of cases of infants suffering from diarrhoea, said WHO spokesperson Margaret Harris: "No medicines, no vaccination activities, no access to safe water and hygiene and no food."

Free! Aisha Al-Ziadne - 17, Rahat Bilal Al-Ziadne - 18, Rahat Gili Margalit - 40., Nir Oz Sapir Cohen - 29, was kidnapped in Nir Oz Ilana Gritsevsky - 30, Nir Oz Shani Goren - 29, Nir Oz

Sapir Cohen and Ilana Gritsevsky are already at the Rafah checkpoint

Together with Mia Shem and Amit Susanna, Hamas released 8 hostages today, not 10 as planned.

According to information published by Egyptian media, Hamas has offered Israel to release seven hostages tomorrow and hand over three bodies.:

A brother and sister from the Al-Ziadna Bedouin family had their father and another brother held hostage. Sasha Trufanov, fiance Sapir Cohen also remains hostage.

Liberated in Israel. Welcome home!

Daily update post:

One of the issues that caused the delay in the hostage release yesterday was Hamas' violation of the agreement. Israel demanded that families will be released together, mothers with their kids, Hamas agreed. Yesterday, on just the second day of implementing the accord, Hamas violated this term, when the list only included a 13 years old girl named Hilla Rotem, but not her 54 years old mom, Ra'aya. This is tragic in itself, but it was compounded by the fact that Hilla is the only daughter of a single mom. Think about what it means to her, that she's being released, but not the only immediate family she has in the world. Israel insisted that Hamas must honor the agreement, but Hamas said the only way they'd stick to the agreement of not separating Hilla Rotem from her mom, is if the girl wouldn't be released. But seeing as the kids are considered the most vulnerable, Israel relented and accepted Hilla being released without her mom. Why is Hamas so insistent on separating the two, we can only guess.

So, for those keeping score, Hamas violated the agreement twice (potentially three time), first with firing rockets 15 minutes after the fighting was supposed to stop, then forcing families apart. The third issue is that Hamas promised the Red Cross would be allowed to meet the hostages remaining in captivity, but so far, that hasn't happened. If it stays that way, that's another violation. We're all waiting to see what will happen today, since on both previous days, the hostages release was delayed.

On its part, Hamas claimed Israel was the one breaking the agreement, even though there was independent confirmation that Israel met its obligations, such as the number of aid trucks allowed into Gaza as part of the accord. Today, the aid trucks went in even earlier, and with video documentation, so that Hamas would not be able to use this as an excuse again. Another thing that Hamas claims is that Israel is supposed to release prisoners based on how long they've been in jail, but Israel said it was not a part of the signed agreement. Hamas gave a list of 14 hostages to be released, eventually it released 13 Israelis kidnapped. The agreement said Israel is to release 3 convicted terrorist per each release hostage, so Israel was set to release 42 prisoners. When it turned out that Hamas is only releaseing 13 people, Israel still released all 42 people who were already went through the process of release. No official explanation was offered, but my guess is to prevent any riots from those three who would not be released, and their families outside.

The other day, a ship flying Malta's flag was attacked by an armed suicide drone in the Indian ocean. It turns out that while being operated by another company, one of the owners of the ship is an Israeli businessman. To target the ship for its ownership rather than operators, implies the intel probably came from Iran. The ship was damaged in the attack, a fire broke out, but no one was hurt. There's an initial report of another ship, supposedly under Israeli ownership, that was kidnapped today near Yemen. If true, this is the third ship targeted for supposedly being Israeli.

A video was circulated the other day, which I will not be sharing, but you can see it here. It shows two Palestinians from Jenin, shot to death for supposedly collaborating with Israel, and then their bodies were hung, a crowd gathered and filmed this, then the bodies were taken down, dragged along the streets, abused, and eventually they were dumped in a garbage site. Are they really informants for Israel? I recently watched a documentary about Yahya Sinwar, Hamas' current leader in Gaza, who was imprisoned by Israel up until 2011. But it wasn't for killing Israelis, it was for murdering Palestinians for supposedly collaborating. An Israeli internal security official said that out of the dozens upon dozens of Palestinians that Sinwar killed with his own hands, maybe 2 or 3 were actual informants. Sinwar murdered these people to make a reputation for himself (he was nicknamed "The Butcher of Khan Younes"), and for an array of other, more personal reasons. So... I'd say most odds are these people had nothing to do with Israel, too.

As antisemitism is on the rise, and too many are adopting a narrative that justified or dismissed Hamas' crimes, the Prime Minister of Ireland did the sameon Twitter. He got community notes correcting his erasure of an Irish-Israeli 9 years old girl's kidnapping.

Just a reminder that when one terrorist in Dublin stabbed five people, three kids included, there were massive riots, with lots of public infrastructure burned down, and rioters arrested. What would Ireland do if they would have been subjected to a terrorist attack equivalent to the one Israel suffered on Oct 7?

The really tall guy is an Israeli officer whose name can't be published, only his initial Y.

He finished a specific military role two months before Hamas' massacre. On the day of Oct 7, he realized that the guy who replaced him, who lives further to the north, would not be able to make it to the fighting zone in time, so Y jumped into his car and drove there, without a weapon or a bulletproof vest. On the way, terrorists ambushed his car, and shot him in the stomach. Realizing he's beginning to pass out, he stopped his car at the side of the road. He woke up to the sight of the second guy in the pic, Mulogate Gazhai. He's a citizen of Eritrea seeking sanctuary in Israel. Mulogate was in a taxi, getting away from the fighting, when he saw the wounded Y's car. He asked the taxi driver to stop. When Y regained consciousness, Mulogate told him, "I'm with you all the way." He stayed by his side, putting pressure on Y's wound to stop him from bleeding out, for almost three hours, hiding together in a ditch on the side of the road, while terrorists keep driving through this area. Today, for having saved Y's life, Mulogate was granted an honorary Israeli citizenship.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

President Biden, facing his own domestic pressures in an election year, has been pushing for an agreement as soon as possible, telling reporters in New York on Monday that, “My hope is by next Monday, we’ll have a cease-fire.”

Those pressures have led Israel to make significant concessions in the negotiations, two officials said, including an offer to release 15 Palestinians jailed on serious terrorism charges in exchange for five female Israeli soldiers being held in Gaza.

That offer was part of a broader proposal to exchange scores of Palestinian prisoners and detainees in exchange for about 35 other hostages during a roughly six-week cease-fire, the officials said.

At a news conference in Washington on Tuesday, Matthew Miller, a State Department spokesman, said that negotiators “made significant progress” last week and were continuing to push for an agreement between Israel and Hamas.

“We are trying to push this deal over the finish line,” Mr. Miller said. “We do think it’s possible.”

But he added, “Ultimately, some of this comes down to Hamas and whether Hamas is willing to agree to a deal that would provide significant benefits to the Palestinian people that they claim to represent.”

A day after President Biden suggested there could be a deal as soon as Monday, a Hamas official indicated the group would not trade Israeli troops held hostage for Palestinians imprisoned for terrorism.

-via NY Times, February 27, 2024

That offer was part of a broader proposal to exchange scores of Palestinian prisoners and detainees in exchange for about 35 other hostages during a roughly six-week cease-fire, the officials said.

hamas already made it clear months ago they will not accept any temporary ceasefire deals and will only agree to permanent ceasefire. it’s pretty predictable that they’d reject this.

Interview with Rami Aman - a Palestinian peace activist from Gaza. In 2015, he founded a series of regular chats, Skype With Your Enemy, in which hundreds of Israelis and Palestinians from the Gaza Strip communicated with each other. In 2020, Hamas arrested Rami Aman for organizing these chats. The activist was tortured. After an international campaign involving 70 public organizations, as well as UN representatives, Aman was convicted and immediately released from prison. Two years ago, he managed to leave Gaza for Egypt:

- After two months of war, Israel and Hamas reached an agreement on a truce and an exchange of hostages - 50 Israeli women and children for 150 Palestinian prisoners (convicted for terrorism). The truce even lasted several days. Can this be considered the result of an Israeli military operation?

- Hamas has been offering just such a deal since the early days of its attack. Now look what it asks in exchange for hostages. No withdrawal of Israeli tanks from Gaza, no return of the million Palestinians displaced from southern Gaza, no peace. No! They are only interested in the exchange of hostages for prisoners and humanitarian aid. They are interested in keeping people in UN schools in the south, not bringing them home. Hamas doesn't care about the Palestinians in Gaza, it uses them for its propaganda.

Hostages are Hamas's last cards. Therefore, now it will play for time, stretch out the truce, release the hostages gradually, “find” them here and there. Pretend that they are negotiating with Islamic Jihad, which allegedly holds some of the hostages. Although, in fact, this is a lie - Hamas controls them all. It's a game.

Hamas does everything to influence public opinion. During the October 7 attack, it claimed in its press releases that it had made a giant breakthrough, with the militants almost on their way to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Naturally, ordinary people living on the border of the sector rushed after the militants to Israel. For those whose relatives were killed or injured during clashes along the fence on the border of the sector, a burnt Israeli tank or tractor is already a victory. What emotions do these people evoke now when they are seen on video in Israel and around the world?

Then Hamas took advantage of the Palestinians when Israel began bombing the sector. They started shouting about the victims of the bombing. In fact, Hamas leaders don't care how many Palestinians die. Palestinian lives are worthless to it. Just like the Israeli ones. Hamas is not interested in the Palestinian population of Gaza. Qatar is not interested in it either. How many millions of dollars in aid has Hamas received from Qatar? Not a single factory was built in Gaza with this money. They simply gave out money as alms.

- Is there any hope that after the end of the war, power in Gaza can be transferred to the Palestinian Authority administration?

No. But that's not even the problem. The Palestinian Authority, Fatah, Hamas, and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) do not represent the Palestinians. They all care only about themselves because they make a lot of money by continuing the conflict. We haven't had elections since 2006. We need to elect new leaders who represent our communities and who care about their real needs. We need to start all over again.

Nobody cares about the Palestinians. Hamas doesn't care about them. They don't care about Qatar. Israel wants them to go somewhere on their own. Israeli peace activists care more about the fate of the Palestinians than Hamas.

- But will Hamas return to power in this case? Many people say that the population of Gaza is indoctrinated by Hamas...

- Those who say this have forgotten how Hamas came to power in Gaza. It simply started with repressions. First, they killed several thousand people and mutilated several thousand more - you know, when they shoot you in the knees as punishment. And they continued to rule through repressions. Every year, they killed several hundred people for political reasons. Hamas security came to see me every year, and every year, they demanded that I confess that I was an Israeli spy.

For example, in 2006, there were five thousand Christian Arabs living in Gaza, and now there are about a thousand left. It was only in the 2010s that Hamas stopped pressuring Christians to show that they were not ISIS. But thousands of Christians left.

In 2019, there were mass protests in Gaza against Hamas rule. They were suppressed by force, and a thousand people were arrested. There were protests before the attack. Hamas felt it could lose control of Gaza. And those who say that all Gazans are indoctrinated by Hamas should note that thousands of Gazan businessmen interacted peacefully with the Israelis every day. Thousands of people went to Israel to work.

Hamas controls the media, and with their help makes everyone believe that Gaza is Hamas. But that's a lie. People in Gaza hate Hamas now. But they have nowhere to go.

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Let me remind you that the main sponsor of HAMAS is... the terrorist state, the russian federation itself. Iranian regime and all this shit gets money from russia. HAMAS has a headquarters in moscow. HAMAS uses the same exact tactics as russian occupiers.

All the problems will disappear if we PARTITION RUSSIA, if we cut russia on pieces so it's unable to sponsor grief all around the world.

the jews used to live in that region but they were kicked out by the romans and have lived in europe for centuries. but the jews were prosecuted and not welcomed there and they wanted to return to their homeland.

christians who did not want the jews in europe started zionism to solve this problem in the 19th century and they called it the "jewish problem" afterwards the jews took over zionism and wanted to return to their homeland specially after WW2.

however there are people in that land who have been living there for centuries already and thats the Palestinians (muslims, christians, jewish and other minorities). so in order to colonize that land and make a jewish majority country, the zionists needed to remove the thousands of arabs from that land and that started in 1948, first the nabka were 700k people were removed from their homes and the naksa were 80k more people were removed from their homes. these places were now modern day israel.

during the nakba, hundreds of communities near gaza evacuated and went to gaza as refugees with the promise that they will return to their villages after the conflict has ended but instead israel stole these villages and built new villages for the jews to live in. and now gaza is densely populated and the majority of its residences are registered refugees because of that.

israel treated and continues to treat the arabs really badly that that their treatment is compared to how nazis treated the jews. the arabs do not like that so they constantly fight the israeli occupation. one of these resistance groups is Hamas based in gaza and they have been neck to neck with israel since the 80s. in the 2000s, israel let hamas take gaza but it imposed a blockade on them. they basically built a wall around gaza, put gunships off the coast to control people coming in and out of gaza while limiting the food and medicine that came into the strip and they constantly harass and hurt the people of gaza. like tanks running over farmer's crops and gunships shooting children playing on the beach. gaza's water salination plant needed maintenance parts but the israelis didn't let them have it so gaza's water is really bad.

now there are thousands of palestinians held in israeli prisons for no real reason including children, basically holding them hostage and harassing them. hamas broke the concreate wall on 10/07 and attacked the neighboring villages (villages stolen from them) and took hostages in order to exchange them with the palestinian prisoners. israel have always bragged about having a great military and defense systems were embarrassed that day and failed to protect its people. hamas stated that they only wanted to take like 20 IDF soldiers from the guard station and retreat however they defeated the guards really easily and were able to go to the villages and take like 200 more.

israel vowed to destroy hamas however they have been conducting indiscriminate air strikes against the civillians of gaza causing thousands of deaths in the matter of weeks. in ukrain 6000 children died because of the war but in gaza 6000 children died in less than a month and entire families (30+ members) were killed ending bloodlines that are centuries old, thats why its called a genocide because its intentional.

since day one hamas offered to negotiate the hostages release but the israeli government declined and instead continued its attack against gaza because they want to end hamas, however many are saying that they have not yet hurt hamas that badly even after all the airstrikes because hamas was prepared for them.

its long but its not complicated, its a classic story between colonized and the colonizers.

tysm for explaining it to me!!

You’d think people advocating for a ceasefire would also be advocating for freeing the hostages, but the closest they get is claiming that Israel is ignoring the terms Hamas is offering, which very well might be true, but also I’m pretty sure Hamas has offered to release the hostages with foreign passports three times as a goodwill gesture and hasn’t done so yet, so I’m not sure one could say they’re negotiating in good faith.

They also occasionally imply that the IDF is bombing without a care for the hostages and indeed that some hostages have died already, which I really hope hasn’t happened but I feel like if it did Hamas would be constantly talking about it. Also, if it happened/happens, it won’t be just political death that the current Israeli govt will suffer once the war is over…

Under its new reported proposal, Hamas would release elderly and sick hostages, civilian women and female soldiers in the course of the second 42-day phase. The reports do not specify how many hostages this would amount to, but the designation would appear to potentially cover some 45 hostages. An unconfirmed report on Monday evening, on Israel’s Channel 12 news, said Hamas was prepared to free fewer than 20 “humanitarian” hostages. The report said Hamas claims not to hold 40 living “humanitarian” hostages. It quoted an Israeli official saying that the response underlines that Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar “does not want an agreement, and is seeking an escalation of regional conflict.” Hamas is reportedly demanding the release of 30 Palestinian security prisoners for each civilian hostage — a tenfold increase from the three security prisoners who were freed for each civilian hostage in November’s deal. Israel would reportedly be required to release 50 Palestinian security prisoners per captive female soldier, of whom 30 would be prisoners serving life sentences. Israel would be required to complete the withdrawal of all IDF troops from Gaza as part of this second phase. The reports were not definitive as to whether the complete withdrawal would be required at the start or in the course of this phase.

This is not an acceptable deal. If anything, it's an incentive for Hamas to launch future hostage-taking raids into Israel. If Hamas is serious about ending the war for the sake of its own people rather than claiming triumph over Israel, it will accept a deal already on the table. This offer is the definition of bad faith, especially given they can't even give an accurate tally of remaining hostages.

As much as I don't trust Netanyahu's government to allow an adequate escape route, housing, food, and medicine for civilians, eventually Israel will have to go into Rafah and finish the job. Otherwise the past six month will just recur again and again. Hamas has proved that it is incapable of being a party to peace.

大家好! I welcomed the ICJ's ruling and order to Israel to take all measures to prevent genocide in Gaza. A ceasefire would've been even better, but for now, this will do. I'll continue to pray for an end to this conflict and a two-state solution to be implemented. It's the only plausible way for both parties to exist in peace.

Hamas has already agreed to release hostages in return for a ceasefire and the only thing that stands in the way is Israel's refusal. To me, it looks like Israel is unreasonable and refuses to compromise. How can negotiations take place if one party insists on wiping out the other? Take the hostages, pull your soldiers out and go, you've done far too much damage, taken too many innocent civilian lives and caused too much suffering! Hopefully countries will begin sanctioning Israel and apply pressure for a ceasefire.

Meanwhile, I continue to visit Muslim stalls and enjoy dishes like nasi padang. We have quite a sizeable Malay population in our country and they're Muslim. Many of them are saddened by the tremendous suffering of the Palestinians. By offering warmth and friendship, all of us are reminded that we're fellow citizens during these very trying times. I just wish certain parties are not so belligerent and would stop fanning wars all over the place (stare at the US and UK).

Countries that are defunding the UNRWA, such as the US, Britain, Australia, Finland, Germany and Italy may potentially cause famine in Gaza. These nations claim to champion human rights so why the double standards when it comes to Palestinians? Do their lives not matter equally? Should they not be allowed basic essentials in order to survive? Why are they being denied food, shelter and warmth?

The hypocrisy is very disturbing at a time when innocent Palestinians are dying, either from a massacre or from starvation. Frankly, I don't trust these countries any longer. Human rights should be universal and not a privilege. I pray that more aid will reach Gaza. 下次见！