Dozens of masked Hamas fighters paraded three of the hostages through a jeering crowd in Gaza, just days after misidentifying a body returned to Israel.
Terror group Hamas is freeing six more hostages to Israel in exchange for the release of hundreds more Palestinian prisoners.
Dozens of masked Hamas fighters paraded three of the hostages through a jeering crowd in Gaza, the latest in a series of similar grim spectacles that have become commonplace during the group’s prisoner exchanges with Jerusalem.
Hisham Al-Sayed, Eliya Cohen, Avera Mengistu, Omer Shem Tov, Tal Shoham, and Omer Wenkert were handed over to humanitarian workers to be transferred to Israeli forces on Feb. 22.
Cohen, Shem Tov, and Wenkert, who appeared pale and malnourished as Hamas fighters led them through the crowd, were all seized initially from the Nova music festival during Hamas’s terror attacks on Oct. 7, 2023.
More than 360 people were killed at that site, with dozens more taken hostage.
Shoham was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri, where more than 100 Israelis were murdered. His wife and two children were also abducted but later freed during a brief truce in November 2023.
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Al-Sayed and Mengistu, meanwhile, have both been held by Hamas for more than a decade after having entered Gaza of their own accord in separate incidents.
The six are the last living hostages from a group of 33 that are slated to be freed in the first stage of Israel and Hamas’s current cease-fire deal. Around 60 more captives, less than half of whom are believed to be alive, remain in Gaza.
In exchange for the hostages, Israel is expected to release 602 Palestinian prisoners and detainees from its jails, dozens of whom have been convicted of serious crimes, including plotting deadly terror attacks on Israelis.
This exchange was nearly derailed when, earlier in the week, Hamas delivered a body to Israel that it said belonged to the hostage Shiri Bibas but was later found to be the body of another victim.
Bibas, her husband, and their two young sons were all abducted during the Oct. 7 attacks.
The Bibas family has been an emblem of the trauma suffered by Israel on that day. Hamas’s misidentification of Bibas’s remains, as well as its staged handover of the coffins of her two young sons, outraged Israelis.
Bibas’s husband, Yarden, was held separately from his family and eventually freed earlier this month, but Israeli officials say that forensic analysis demonstrated the couple’s 10-month-old son Kfir and 4-year-old son Ariel were killed in captivity.
Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said the forensic analysis showed that members of Hamas “did not shoot the boys” but “killed them with their bare hands” and then “committed horrific acts to cover up these atrocities.”
Hamas denied the accusations and said that Bibas and her sons were killed by an Israeli airstrike early in the war.
Neither Israel’s nor Hamas’s claims have been independently verified.
The current cease-fire has paused the fighting, but prospects of a definitive end to the war remain unclear. Hamas has been attempting to demonstrate its control over the Gaza Strip despite losing thousands of fighters during the war and Israel’s demands that it must be removed as a governing body from the region.
Both sides have said they intend to start talks on a second stage, which mediators believe would result in an agreement that Hamas will return all remaining hostages and Israel will withdraw its troops from the region.
Dan Berger and Reuters contributed to this report.
