JERUSALEM: Israeli commandos have recovered the body of a hostage held in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, the military said on Saturday, three months after he pleaded for his release in a video issued by his Palestinian Islamic Jihad captors.
Elad Katzir, a 47-year-old farmer from Kibbutz Nir Oz, was among 253 people dragged into Gaza during an Oct. 7 cross-border rampage by Hamas-led Palestinian gunmen that triggered Israel’s ongoing offensive in the enclave.
Katzir was killed by Islamic Jihad, the military statement said, citing intelligence information which it did not detail.
There was no immediate comment on the Telegram channel used by Islamic Jihad during the war.
Katzir’s father, Avraham, was among some 1,200 people killed in Israel on Oct. 7, according to official tallies, while his mother Hanna was also taken hostage but freed in November under a ceasefire with Hamas, Gaza’s dominant Islamist movement.
Qatari and Egyptian mediators have been trying, so far fruitlessly, to secure another truce that might return some of the 129 remaining hostages. Hamas wants any deal to end the war, which Gaza health officials say has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians. But Israel intends to fight on until Hamas falls.
In a Jan. 8 video posted by Islamic Jihad online, Katzir said: “I was close to dying more than once. It’s a miracle I’m still alive ... I want to tell my family that I love them very much and I miss them very much.”
Based on various sources of information, Israel has declared at least 35 hostages as dead in Gaza captivity. Palestinian factions have said some were killed in Israeli strikes. While confirming this in several cases, Israel says that, in others, hostages whose bodies were recovered bore signs of execution.
Israeli troops recover body of hostage from Gaza’s Khan Younis, military says
https://arab.news/v22kh
Israeli troops recover body of hostage from Gaza’s Khan Younis, military says
- Elad Katzir, a 47-year-old farmer from Kibbutz Nir Oz, was among 253 people dragged into Gaza during an Oct. 7 cross-border rampage
Hamas says path for Gaza must begin with end to ‘aggression’
- Trump’s board met for its inaugural session in Washington on Thursday, with a number of countries pledging money and personnel to rebuild the Palestinian territory
GAZA CITY: Discussions on Gaza’s future must begin with a total halt to Israeli “aggression,” Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas said after US President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace met for the first time.
“Any political process or any arrangement under discussion concerning the Gaza Strip and the future of our Palestinian people must start with the total halt of aggression, the lifting of the blockade, and the guarantee of our people’s legitimate national rights, first and foremost their right to freedom and self-determination,” Hamas said in a statement Thursday.
Trump’s board met for its inaugural session in Washington on Thursday, with a number of countries pledging money and personnel to rebuild the Palestinian territory, more than four months into a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted however that Hamas must disarm before any reconstruction begins.
“We agreed with our ally the US that there will be no reconstruction of Gaza before the demilitarization of Gaza,” Netanyahu said.
The Israeli leader did not attend the Washington meeting but was represented by his foreign minister Gideon Saar.
Trump said several countries, mostly in the Gulf, had pledged more than seven billion dollars to rebuild the territory.
Muslim-majority Indonesia will take a deputy commander role in a nascent International Stabilization Force, the unit’s American chief Major General Jasper Jeffers said.
Trump, whose plan for Gaza was endorsed by the UN Security Council in November, also said five countries had committed to providing troops, including Morocco, Kazakhstan, Kosovo and Albania.
