AFP & Reuters / January 4, 2025
Family of now 19-year-old conscript Liri Albag appeals to PM to ‘take decisions as if it were your own children there’.
The armed wing of Hamas has released a video it says is of an Israeli hostage held in Gaza since its October 2023 attack.
Liri Albag, described by local media as a soldier, was 18 when she was captured by Palestinian militants at the Nahal Oz base on the Gaza border along with six other women conscripts, five of whom remain in captivity.
In the undated, three-and-a-half-minute video recording, Albag, now 19, called in Hebrew for the Israeli government to secure her release.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a campaign group for relatives of those abducted, said the family has not authorised publication of the video.
The family said in a statement that the video had “torn our hearts to pieces”, adding: “This is not the daughter and sister we know. Her severe psychological distress is evident.
“We appeal to the prime minister, world leaders and all decision-makers: it’s time to take decisions as if it were your own children there.”
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said in response to the video that Israel continued to work tirelessly to bring the hostages home, adding: “Anyone who dares to harm our hostages will bear full responsibility for their actions.”
He is under growing pressure from hostages’ families to reach a deal that will free their loved ones, with weekly demonstrations organised by the hostages forum, the latest in Tel Aviv on Saturday.
His critics accuse him of stalling on a deal.
Hamas and its ally Islamic Jihad have released a number of videos of Israeli hostages in their custody during nearly 15 months of fighting in Gaza.
The militants seized 251 hostages during the 2023 attack, of whom 96 remain in Gaza. The Israeli military says 34 of those are dead.
It comes as ceasefire talks between the two sides resumed in Qatar on Saturday.
Mediators Qatar, Egypt and the US have been engaged in months of efforts that have failed to end the war.
Meanwhile, Palestinian medics said Israeli military strikes in the Gaza Strip had killed at least 70 people since Friday.
At least 17 of those who died were killed in airstrikes on two houses in Gaza City, the first of which destroyed the home of the Al-Ghoula family in the early hours, medics and residents said.
“Most of them are women and children, they are all civilians, there is no one there who shot missiles, or is from the resistance,” neighbour Ahmed Ayyan told Reuters.
Civil defence spokesperson Mahmud Bassal said Israeli drones had “also fired on ambulance staff”.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the incident.
Another strike on a house in Gaza City killed five people later on Saturday, the Palestinian civil emergency service said, adding that at least 10 others were feared trapped under the rubble.
Elsewhere, the civil defence agency said an Israeli strike had killed five security officers tasked with accompanying aid convoys as they drove through the southern city of Khan Younis.
The Israeli army claimed the five had been “implicated in terrorist activities” and had not been escorting aid trucks at the time of the strike. Israel does not allow foreign journalists into Gaza to verify its claims.
The Israeli military said earlier its forces had continued their operations this week in Beit Hanoun town in the northern edge of the territory, where the army has been operating for three months, and claimed it had destroyed a military complex that had been used by Hamas.
AFP images also showed Palestine Red Crescent paramedics in Gaza City moving the body of one of their colleagues, his green jacket laid over the blanket that covered his corpse.
The health ministry in Gaza said a total of 136 people had been killed over the previous 48 hours. Photographs sent by news wires showed many children among the dead and injured.
The latest killings came as the US President Joe Biden’s administration reportedly notified Congress of a proposed $8bn arms sale to Israel.
The deal would need approval from House of Representatives and Senate committees and includes munitions for fighter jets and attack helicopters as well as artillery shells, Reuters reported citing two sources familiar with the proposal. The package also includes small-diameter bombs and warheads, according to the sources.
On Sunday, the Israeli military meanwhile said it had intercepted a missile launched from Yemen in the latest of a series of attacks by Houthi rebels in support of Palestinians.
Israel launched its assault on Gaza in response to the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, in which militants stormed border communities from Gaza, killing about 1,200 people and seizing about 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Its military campaign, with the stated goal of eradicating Hamas, has levelled swathes of the territory, driving most people from their homes, and has killed 45,717 Palestinians, according to the Gaza health ministry.
