Israel said its troops had killed three Gazan hostages they mistakenly identified as a threat, and the armed forces expressed deep regret for the incident, which sparked protests in Tel Aviv.
The Israeli military said Yotam Haim, Alon Shamriz and Samer El Talalqa were shot dead during operations in a neighborhood of Gaza City.
This trio was among those kidnapped during the October 7 raids by the Islamist group Hamas on Israel, during which 1,200 people were killed. people, mostly civilians, and about 240 hostages were taken, according to Israeli officials.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the deaths of the three hostages an unbearable tragedy, while the White House called the incident a tragic mistake.
After news of the incident spread, hundreds of people gathered in protest outside Israel’s Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv.
Participants waved Israeli flags and displayed placards with the faces of some of the 129 people still being held in the Gaza Strip.
“Every day a hostage is killed,” read one of the posters.
In response to the biggest attacks in its history, Israel has launched an air and ground assault on the Gaza Strip, vowing to destroy Hamas, the organization that rules the territory, and recover hostages.
Hamas says the war has killed at least 18,800 people and left the Gaza Strip in ruins.
In Tel Aviv, relatives of the hostages called on the government to make a deal to free more people.
“I’m dying of fear,” said Merav Svirsky, the sister of Hamas hostage Itay Svirsky. “We demand an agreement now.”
In November, a short-lived ceasefire brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States freed more than 100 hostages in exchange for Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
On Friday, news platform Axios reported that the director of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, David Barnea, was scheduled to meet Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani in Europe this weekend.
Axios said officials will discuss resuming negotiations on a deal to secure the release of the remaining hostages.
Fierce fighting continued in the Gaza Strip, and Hamas said it had blown up a house housing Israeli soldiers in the southern city of Khan Yunis.
Al Jazeera news channel reported that one of its journalists, Samer Abudaqa, was killed and another journalist, Wael al-Dahdouh, was wounded by shrapnel from an Israeli rocket in Khan Yunis.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, more than 60 journalists and media workers have been killed since the start of the war.
“We were reporting, filming, finished work and were with the civil defense, but when we went back a rocket hit us,” said W. al Dahdouh, who lost his wife, two children and a grandson earlier in the war.
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2024-08-03 09:03:58
