The Times of Israel is liveblogging Saturday’s events as they happen.
Parents of sons held hostage in Gaza oppose deal, urge military action for release
Several relatives of Israelis who are presumed to be held hostage in Gaza question the deal to release 50 Israeli hostages for some 150 Palestinian prisoners, an agreement that began to be implemented Friday with the release of the first 13 Israeli hostages.
“The most correct and effective way of retrieving the hostages is by applying uncompromising pressure on Hamas, until the hostages become a liability for Hamas instead of an asset,” says a spokesperson of Tikvah, a new forum for families of hostages that oppose making hostage deals with Hamas.
Forum founder Eliyahu Libman heads the municipality of the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba near Hebron. His son Elyakim is believed to be held hostage following the October 7 atrocities. “We’re glad about the return of each and every hostage,” his forum tells The Times of Israel in reply to a request to interview Libman.
A forum spokesperson says the forum members has decided to stop giving interviews on the subject.
Hamas, which is believed to have abducted 240 hostages from Israel released on Friday 13 hostages out of 50 included in an exchange deal that Qatar helped mediate. Israel is expected to release a total of 150 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the hostages. The deal is expected to happen in several stages over the course of a lull in fighting of at least four days.
Another parent from the Tikvah forum, Zvika Mor, also opposes the deal. “Our eagerness to receive the hostages raises their price,” Mor, whose son is believed to be in Gaza, tells Channel 14.
Keren Gonen, whose sister Romi is thought to be held hostage, dismisses these considerations.
“I don’t care about anything. It doesn’t matter. Nothing else matters,” she tells The Times of Israel at a solidarity rally in Tel Aviv with the hostages and their families. “Nothing else should matter. This [getting the hostages back] is the only thing that should matter.”
Most Israeli hostages freed Friday appear in good physical health, says hospital
Most of the Israeli hostages released by Hamas today appeared to be in good physical health upon return to Israel, the hospital receiving them says.
A statement from Schneider Children’s hospital, where four mothers and four child hostages were released, says that doctors had conducted a preliminary examination and said they were all in good physical condition.
A total of 13 Israeli hostages were freed Friday and transferred to three separate hospitals across Israel.
Danielle Aloni, her daughter Emilia Aloni, Doron Asher, and her daughters Raz Asher and Aviv Asher, and Keren Munder, her mother Ruti Munder and her son Ohad Munder were being treated Schneider Children’s Medical Center in Petah Tikva. Five other Israeli hostages, all elderly women, are being cared for at Wolfson Hospital in Holon.
Wolfson says some of the women are “feeble and exhausted” and are not likely to be allowed to go home tomorrow, Ynet reports.
Israel working with Thailand, Philippines to reunite freed foreign nationals with families
The 11 foreign nationals — 10 from Thailand and 1 from the Philippines — who were freed as hostages by Hamas in Gaza today are expected to remain in the hospital overnight in Israel as medical authorities complete their health examinations, the Foreign Ministry says.
The ministry says workers are “in regular contact with the embassies of Thailand and the Philippines,” following the release of the hostages, and notice was given to their families.
The ministry says the foreign nationals “are expected to return to their families after almost 50 days in Hamas captivity.”
Thai Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara wrote online that he was “overjoyed.”
Thailand had secured an agreement via Iran, Hamas’s backers, for the release of their citizens.
Thais were the biggest single group of foreigners taken hostage. Thai and Filipino nationals often travel to Israel to work as farmhands, caregivers or other types of killed laborer, at wages considerably higher than those at they can earn at home.
Yoni Asher, whose family was freed from Hamas: I am happy but won’t celebrate until all hostages return
Yoni Asher, whose wife and two young daughters were released today after being held as hostages by Hamas terrorists in Gaza for 49 days, releases a short video about their safe return.
Asher’s wife, Doron, and their two young daughters Raz, 5, and Aviv, 2, were taken on October 7 from the sealed room of Doron’s mother’s house in Kibbutz Nir Oz, near Gaza. Doron’s mother, Efrat Katz, was killed in the shock assault, when terrorists invaded Israel and rampaged through communities and an outdoor music festival for hours, killing 1,200 people. Terrorists also took about 240 hostages.
Asher became a prominent figure in the organization that represents the families of the hostages.
Asher’s family were released Friday afternoon as part of a multi-day lull in fighting in Gaza that includes the release of at least 50 Israeli hostages overall. The first group of 13 hostages included the mother and daughters, as well as two other mothers and their young children, and elderly women. A separate deal between Thailand and Iran also saw the release of 11 Thai nationals and one Philippines national.
“My family Doron Raz and Aviv returned home to me…. I am determined to help my family recover from the terrible trauma and loss we went through, for the future of the girls and Doron,” he says.
“Complex days are still ahead of me. I must express thanks and appreciation to our brave sons risking their lives protecting the nation, to the IDF, the Israeli government, and the war cabinet and all those who are engaged in the work. Thanks to the wonderful people of Israel, for the thousands of messages and reinforcements. A big thank you to the families of the hostages who are working to get everyone back,” he says.
Asher also gives a special thanks to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, made up of “private people who left everything — families, careers — and gave all their time, energy, blood, and soul for the goal of rescuing my family.”
“I am happy that I got my family back…But I don’t celebrate, I won’t celebrate until the last of the hostages returns. I want to emphasize — our children, our fathers, our mothers, our sisters — are at this time in captivity, there are people whose hearts are broken at this time and I want to make sure that every last hostage person will return home,” he adds.
Uncertain about their own loved ones, families rejoice in 13 other hostages’ release
Friday has been the happiest day in a long time for the family of Shiri Bibas, a mother of two boys younger than 4 whom Hamas terrorists abducted on October 7.
Bibas remains a hostage. She is not among the 13 Israelis released from Gaza, and authorities have given her family no estimated time for her release.
Her relatives are uplifted by the release of 13 other hostages, all of them women or children. It “fills our hearts with joy that we haven’t felt since this started,” Shiri Bibas’s cousin, Jimmy Miller, tells The Times of Israel.
Shiri Bibas’s abduction is iconic. Videos of her capture show terrorists leading a terrified Bibas around in Kibbutz Nir Oz while she held her two ginger sons, Ariel and Kfir.
A total of 50 Israelis are to be freed in return for 150 Palestinian prisoners during a 4-day ceasefire that began Friday. Bibas’s family hopes that she, her sons and her husband Yarden are among the remaining 37 Israelis who are to be part of the remainder of the exchange.
Several relatives of hostages understood to be among the remaining 37 Israelis said that authorities have not yet informed them on whether their loved ones are to be released in future exchange, Channel 12 reports Friday.
Miller and several other relatives are attending a solidarity rally with the hostages at Tel Aviv’s so-called Hostage Square, opposite the Kirya army headquarters. They’re wearing T-shirts emblazoned with a drawing of the Bibas family.
Armed Palestinian groups in W. Bank reportedly execute two men accused of spying for Israel
Members of Palestinian armed groups in the West Bank city of Tulkarem have reportedly executed two men accused of spying for Israel.
Pictures on social media show the bodies of the two men hanging from an electricity poll.