Video Shows U.S. and Israeli Hostages Alive in Gaza

Hello and welcome to BBC News. I’m Lukwesa Burak. We start the program in the Middle East, where Israel’s foreign minister has said a planned ground assault on the Southern Gaza city of Rafah could be suspended if a deal emerges to free the hostages still being held by Hamas.

(00:18)
Israel Katz said that their freedom was a top priority. Hostage release also forms a key part of international mediation efforts to bring about a ceasefire in the Gaza War. Hamas has posted a new video which shows two of the hostages captured during its October attack. Keith Siegel and Omri Miran both identify themselves in the video. Whilst it’s not dated, there is a reference to the recent Passover holiday. It’s the second such video that Hamas, considered a terror group by the UK and US governments, has published in the past few days. Our correspondent Anna Foster sent us this update from Tel Aviv.

Omri Miran’s father was actually already on the list of confirmed speakers for this event tonight. When he got up on the stage, he talked about the moment. He said he was sitting, having coffee with someone and talking about his grandchildren when the man that he was talking to held his phone and said, look, here’s a video, they’ve released a video of Omri.

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Now, what was also interesting as the crowd were gathered here tonight is they showed that video in full. It’s not something that normally happens because of course when you see the people in it, the two men in this case looking very malnourished, obviously speaking under duress, sending messages to their families and urging the Israeli government to come to some sort of arrangement, some sort of deal to try and achieve their release.

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Now, of course, that deal and those talks have been going on for weeks and weeks now. The last time we saw a significant hostage release was at the end of last year. At one point we were told the talks had really very much broken down. The two sides weren’t really in communication at all, but the Egyptian delegations visit this week and the further efforts of the US and the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, we’re sort of led to believe the briefings are that perhaps they’re moving slightly closer in terms of trying to achieve a deal.

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But certainly those powerful messages that we heard on the stage tonight from the hostage families, they were talking directly to Israel’s leaders, directly to the politicians, and they were saying, you need to do a deal while they’re still alive. While we know that our loved ones are still alive, you need to do what they can to ensure their release now.

That was Anna Foster there. The US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, is set to travel to Saudi Arabia on Monday as negotiations between Israel and Hamas remain in limbo. This will be his seventh trip to the Middle East since the war began. It’s part of President Biden’s efforts to encourage a ceasefire and prevent the conflict from spreading. He’ll also call for the release of those hostages from the October 7th attack. Mohamed Taha is from the BBC Arabic service, and he spoke to me earlier for more on those fragile hostage negotiations.

Both parties are putting massive amount of pressures on each party to accept the hostage deal without massive amount of conditions. Israel is putting pressure, they are intensifying the military operation. They are threatening of starting the operation in Rafah overnight. We saw 30 people died in shelling in middle Gaza and in Rafah, 10 of them are children. Israel believes that only military pressure on Hamas would make them accept the hostage deal.

(03:45)
On the other side, we saw Hamas releasing these hostage videos urging the Israeli government to accept that deal. I heard a clip of Hamas officials saying that Israel want them voluntarily to hand back the hostages, voluntarily to accept Israel continuing occupying Gaza, voluntarily not having a permanent ceasefire. Hamas would say, why on earth we accept all of this without a perspective of ending this war.

What is Mr. Blinken likely to achieve? I mean, he’s got a big job as he heads out tomorrow.

Indeed. Mr. Blinken in his tours, as you said, this is tour number seven, is trying to put this conflict in a wider context. He’s trying to convince the Arab countries that the United States is committed to the two-state solution. Is committed to the long term solution to the Palestinian cause. He’s trying to convince Saudi Arabia to return back to the path of normalization, the relationship with Israel. He’s trying to get the wider perspective.

(04:57)
Even Hamas announced it last week that they are willing to discuss being disarmed if the two-state solution path would be viable so he’s trying to do that. Israel is only trying to achieve the two main aims of this war, destroying Hamas, releasing the hostages. The United States trying to find a longer deal, a long term deal for the Palestinian coast that would give the Americans a peace of mind for amount of time.