The Palestinian Hamas movement blames Israel and the US for the deaths of six hostages found dead in a tunnel near the Gaza city of Rafah on Sunday, the group said in a statement, cited by Al Jazeera.
“The responsibility for the deaths of prisoners lies with the occupation, which insists on continuing the war of extermination, and with the US administration for its support of the aggression,” Hamas said. “The prisoners were killed by the Zionist bombardment,” it added.
They then urged US President Joe Biden to “stop supporting the enemy” if he really cares about the lives of the hostages. “We were more concerned about the lives of the prisoners than Biden, so we accepted his proposal and the [UN] Security Council resolution, while [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu rejected them,” he said.
Three of the slain hostages were on a “humanitarian” list of captives and were due to be released in the first stage of a proposed hostage deal, Army Radio reported, citing its security sources.
On the same day, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reported that the bodies of American-Israeli citizen Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, Russian-Israeli Alexander Lobanov, 32, as well as Eden Yerushalmi, 24, Ori Danino and Almog Sarusi, 25, and Carmel Gat, 40, were found.
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2024-09-01 17:20:20
