The Israeli army said its troops shot and killed three hostages on Friday, December 15, after "mistakenly" identifying them as a threat.
"During combat in Shejaiya, the IDF (army) mistakenly identified three Israeli hostages as a threat. As a result, the troops fired toward them and they were killed," the army said in a statement on Friday, December 15. "The IDF began reviewing the incident immediately... Immediate lessons from the event have been learned, which have been passed on to all IDF troops in the field," it added, expressing "deep remorse over the tragic incident."
The army identified two of the hostages as Yotam Haim, who was taken from Kibbutz Kfar Aza during Hamas's October 7 attack, and Samer El-Talalqa, taken from Kibbutz Nir Am. It said it was withholding the third hostage's name at the family's request.