“We are in danger here.” In a video, released this Saturday April 27 by Hamas, two Israeli hostages kidnapped last October 7 by the Palestinian Islamist movement appear. The two people, filmed sitting on a plastic chair in front of a white wall, introduce themselves as Keith Sigel and Omri Miran, aged 64 and 47 respectively. Their identity was immediately confirmed by the Hostage Families Forum.
If the video is not dated, Omri Miran indicates that he has been in the hands of Hamas for 202 days – a date which would correspond to Thursday April 25. The Israeli also describes a “difficult situation”, due to the “numerous bombings” by Israel on the Gaza Strip.
This video comes a few days after the publication of other images, on April 24, of an Israeli hostage named Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 24, and filmed in similar conditions. He appears with a shaved head, his arm amputated up to the elbow and indicates that he was “arrested” during the Supernova music festival in Réïm. “Benyamin Netanyahu and his government should be ashamed,” he repeats in the video, accusing them of having “left them for 200 days”.
Hersh Goldberg-Polin also accuses Israeli military aircraft of having killed “70 detainees” in bombings. “All the offers that were made to you were rejected,” denounces Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who we do not know if he is speaking under duress.
The state of health of the hostages “has deteriorated”
The hostage says he is locked in “hellish” basements lacking water, sunlight, food and medical treatment. Already, in January, the support association Hostages Families HQ Group alerted the BBC on the state of health of the hostages. According to the organization, a third of them suffer from chronic illnesses and need medical treatment. “The situation of certain captives has deteriorated and they are now in danger,” insists the association, which claims to be in contact with the Israeli intelligence services.
Since the Hamas offensive, the BBC regularly updates a list of hostages with their stories “which have been confirmed” by the British channel or “reported in a credible manner”. We thus find Doron Steinbrecher, a 30-year-old veterinary nurse, who was in her apartment on Kibbutz Kfar Aza when Hamas attacked. According to information reported by the Times of Israelshe allegedly sent a voice message to her friends on October 7, testifying: “They arrived, they got me.”
Also included in this list are people kidnapped during the Supernova music festival, including Ori Danino, 25, who “is said to have escaped from the festival in his car”, specifies the BBC. Before adding: “However, it is assumed that he was captured after returning to try to save some people he had met there.”
Currently, the Israeli army estimates that 129 hostages remain captive in the Gaza Strip, 34 of whom are considered dead. On October 7, Hamas kidnapped some 250 people. In November, 50 of them – mainly women and children – were released in a deal, in exchange for a truce, the release of Palestinian detainees and the entry of humanitarian aid into the enclave.
Towards a new truce?
Such a truce, accompanied by the release of hostages, is currently under discussion between Hamas and the Jewish state. A senior Hamas official said on Sunday April 28 that the Palestinian movement would respond on Monday in Egypt to Israel’s proposals on the truce. According to a newspaper source Haaretz, Hamas would have presented “feasible” figures in terms of hostages it can release. “This is a positive development” indicating a “desire to promote an agreement”, estimates the Israeli daily.
However, the details of the counter-proposal have not been filtered, but according to the Axios site, which cites Israeli officials, it includes the desire to discuss “the establishment of lasting calm” in Gaza. In this sense, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Stéphane Séjourné, began a tour of the Middle East this Sunday. After a stop in Lebanon then in Saudi Arabia, he will be received on Tuesday April 30 in Israel.
Furthermore, and a sign that the negotiations are in full swing under the aegis of Egypt and Qatar, the American Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, is expected this Sunday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where he will discuss “the efforts ongoing aimed at achieving a ceasefire in Gaza which allows the release of the hostages”, and will also “emphasize the importance of preventing a regional extension” of the war, the Department of Defense said on Saturday. State.