Israel has assessed that “at least one or two” hostages held in Gaza are in life-threatening condition, according to a Hebrew media report on Saturday, a day after US President Donald Trump suggested that fewer than 20 hostages remain alive, bucking Israel’s official figures and sparking despair from the captives’ families.
According to Israel’s Channel 12 television network, Israeli officials fear that several of the living hostages are in serious danger of death and in dire need of medical attention.
“Releasing the hostages is an urgent need,” an unnamed senior official told Channel 12.”
However, the report said the officials were unsure what led Trump to conclude that “a couple of them are not around any longer” during a press conference on Friday.
In the wake of Trump’s remarks, Israel’s hostage point man Gal Hirsch told the families that “According to the information we have, there is no change in the number of living hostages.”
“Twenty of the hostages are alive, two [others] are in grave danger for their lives, 28 are no longer alive and have been declared deceased,” Hirsch wrote to the families.
Not satisfied, the families then demanded that Israel present them with all information regarding their loved ones’ conditions.
Israel has long stated that terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 50 hostages, including 49 of the 251 abducted by Hamas-led terrorists on October 7, 2023. They include the bodies of at least 28 confirmed dead by the IDF. Twenty are believed to be alive, and there are grave concerns for the well-being of two others, Israeli officials have said. Hamas is also holding the body of an IDF soldier killed in Gaza in 2014.
The heightened concern for the hostages came as Israel prepares to launch a large-scale operation to conquer Gaza City and amid a flurry of international efforts to bring the sides back to the negotiation table to forestall the operation.
According to a Channel 13 report, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided Saturday to send a negotiating delegation to participate in talks with mediators to reach a ceasefire in Gaza, almost a week after Hamas said they agreed to a proposal for a partial deal that Israel had agreed to prior.
The outlet reported that Netanyahu’s decision came after he was told in a meeting that the hostages could be executed by their captors or killed by IDF munitions if the army presses on with its planned takeover of Gaza City.
Despite Netanyahu reportedly acquiescing to send a delegation to the upcoming talks, Channel 13 said that there was currently no agreed-upon date or location for the talks.
Meanwhile, Arab mediators Qatar and Egypt have grown increasingly frustrated with Netanyahu over the “zig-zag” that he has plotted over recent months regarding his position on a potential hostage release and ceasfire deal, Channel 12 reported on Saturday.
The two mediating countries were able to successfully convince Hamas to walk back from almost all of its demands and agree to a framework that it had rejected in the past, and which Israel had previously agreed to, only to discover that they would now be forced to try and convince Israel to restart talks on the phased agreement.
The deal that Hamas agreed to earlier this week would allow for a 60-day ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and the release of 10 living hostages. During the truce, additional talks would be held on freeing the remaining hostages and permanently ending the war.
Although Israel agreed to this framework months ago, Netanyahu has shifted away in recent weeks from supporting this option and instead now insists on a comprehensive deal rather than a partial, phased agreement.
Netanyahu’s vision for a comprehensive deal to end the war includes the disarmament of Hamas and the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip, as well as the transfer of governance to a body that is not Hamas or the Palestinian Authority.
His apparent U-turn regarding a partial deal has caused significant displeasure with the mediators, and with Egypt in particular. A senior official in Cairo was quoted by Channel 12 as saying that “Israel’s conditions are unworkable and harm the chances of reaching a ceasefire.”
Another Channel 12 report aired Saturday said that Netanyahu and his top adviser, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, assessed during a recent meeting that Israel has Trump’s full support for its military offensive in Gaza City, but only for a limited period.
The network quoted the two as saying that Trump wants a quick and decisive operation, and doesn’t want the war against Hamas to drag on more than necessary.
During the same meeting, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir was said to have clashed with far-right ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir, who assailed him for saying the military wasn’t sure how long it would take to evacuate Gaza City’s civilian population.
“We ordered you [to carry out] a quick operation. In my opinion, you can besiege them. Whoever doesn’t evacuate, don’t let them. No water, no electricity, they can die of hunger or surrender. This is what we want and you’re capable [of doing it],” the network quoted Smotrich as telling Zamir.
Ben Gvir then asked the IDF chief whether he was “scared of the military advocate general’ — the IDF’s top attorney — to which Zamir pointed out that the military is “operating in other areas, in Khan Younis and Rafah.”
“This isn’t what the political leadership ordered. You don’t want to defeat [Hamas],” Smotrich declared of Zamir, who was said to have retorted: “You don’t understand anything. You don’t know what a brigade or battalion is. This takes time.”
The planned campaign to capture Gaza City has sparked a major international outcry, with governments and humanitarian groups warning of potentially disastrous consequences for Gaza’s civilians, noting widespread malnutrition that has recently worsened significantly in the Palestinian enclave throughout the 22-month war.
It has also sparked fear from the families of the hostages, who fear that it will serve as the final nail in the coffin for their loved ones, as Hamas has vowed to execute captives if IDF troops approach their positions.