Today, Hamas released the last of the surviving Israeli hostages. Of the 251 people abducted into Gaza on October 7th 2023, the final 20 have now come home, under the ceasefire deal facilitated by U.S. president Donald Trump. They were handed over in two groups to the Red Cross before being reunited with their loved ones. Three of the survivors have been airlifted to hospital.
For many families, this morning was the first time they had any confirmation that their husbands, sons, and fathers were even still alive, when Hamas handed over the list of people set to be released. They will have spent the last two years agonising over their fate. Then there are those who will never return home—there remains in Gaza the bodies of 26 hostages who were murdered by Hamas terrorists or died at some point during captivity.
It is important that we remember the stories of both the survivors and those who lost their lives to Hamas’s unfathomable cruelty. While ‘pro-Palestine’ protestors in the West chant slogans like “death to the IDF,” “from the river to the sea,” and “globalise the intifada,” do they realise that this is what they are enabling? The murder of young people attending a music festival? The rape of women? The kidnapping and torture of children and the elderly?
As difficult as it may be to look the barbarism of Hamas squarely in the face, it is necessary to name it plainly. If we don’t, there can be no justice for the living or the dead.
