Then Witkoff came together in a neighboring building with members of the hostages. After the meeting, the forum of hostage families, the most important advocacy representatives of the relatives, said that Witkoff had “personally” agreed to stand up for the release of the remaining hostages together with US President Donald Trump.
The war in the Gaza Strip was triggered by Hamas’s brutal major attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. According to Israeli information, 1219 people were killed, 251 people were dragged into the Gaza Strip as hostages. 49 hostages are still held there, at least 27 of them are dead according to the army.
Yotam Cohen, the brother of the 21-year-old Nimrod Cohen dragged by Hamas, told the AFP news agency on Saturday: “The war must end. The Israeli government will not end it voluntarily.” It would therefore have to be “stopped,” he said with a view to important allies like the USA. Witkoff had already met with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Thursday.
Since then, Israel has massively military in the Gaza Strip in response to the Hamas attack. According to the Hamas authorities, which cannot be confirmed independently, more than 60,300 people have been killed so far. After almost 22 months of war, the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is devastating. More than a hundred aid organizations recently warned of a “mass starvation” in the Palestinian area.
The Hamas and an allied militant Palestinian group had published two videos in the past few days, which showed starved and weakened hostages in the Gaza Strip.
