Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew a parallel between the kidnapping of hundreds of people in Israel on October 7, 2023, and the 2014 abduction of hundreds of schoolgirls in Nigeria, in comments aired Sunday.
The remarks came during a meeting between Netanyahu and unspecified relatives of hostages several weeks ago, as the premier attempted to push back on the idea that the kidnappings of October 7 had been singular in scope or effect, according to Channel 12 news.
A recording of the comments aired by the channel picks up mid-conversation, with Netanyahu claiming that no country has gone to lengths Israel has for its hostages.
“People are amazed that we are prepared to do what we have done, for…,” he is heard saying, before a person identified as a relative of a hostage cuts in.
“There weren’t many countries that were in our situation and abandoned [as] on October 7,” she says. A second relative adds: “When we are faced with the kidnapping of 250 people, including children, that’s something that has never happened before, so you know…”
In the recording, Netanyahu retorts that “I think what happened was a terrible catastrophe, the worst catastrophe visited upon us since the Holocaust.
“But if you want to talk about what’s happened around the world, that’s incorrect,” he adds. “It’s incorrect regarding Boko Haram, it’s incorrect about other places, many, many others. It’s just that nobody has done what we are doing. That’s the situation.”
Two hundred and fifty-one people, most of them civilians, were kidnapped to Gaza during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023. The total includes the bodies of some people killed during the onslaught.
Fifty-seven hostages kidnapped that day remain in captivity, about a third of whom are believed to still be alive. The body of an IDF soldier killed in Gaza in 2014 is also being held.
In April 2014, 276 teenage girls were kidnapped from a school in Chibok, Nigeria, by the Islamist terror group Boko Haram. Over 80 girls are believed to remain in captivity, while some of those who have returned over the years came back pregnant or with accounts of being forced into marriage or sold into sexual slavery.
The West African jihadist group, which has been affiliated with the Islamic State, is thought to be responsible for the kidnappings of thousands of Nigerians, many of them young girls.
Russia has also been accused of kidnapping thousands of Ukrainian children since its invasion of that country.
According to Channel 12 news, families left the meeting “frustrated and even angry.” It did not cite a source for the information.
Relatives had met with Netanyahu to seek answers about the state of efforts to free the remaining hostages, amid widespread exasperation over the prolonged crisis. Netanyahu has been accused of prioritizing military gains against Hamas over freeing the hostages.
In the recording, Netanyahu can be heard defending his efforts for the hostages after a relative accuses him of downplaying the unique horrors of the October 7 attack, which also saw some 1,200 people killed, many of them civilians slaughtered in horrific massacres.
“No, I’m saying that the idea that hostages were taken in large numbers and all sorts of things were demanded — that’s something that shows our willingness and the efforts we have deployed and are deploying in order to bring them home,” Netanyahu says. “That’s it.”
Families of hostages are preparing this week to step up advocacy for a deal to free their loved ones as the crisis reaches the 600-day mark, days after indirect talks with Hamas in Doha aimed at ending the war fell apart.
Supporters have argued that a newly intensified Israel Defense Forces operation to take over much of Gaza is further endangering the hostages and making a deal impossible. Netanyahu and his allies have claimed that the military campaign is essential to pressure Hamas into a deal.
The terror group has demanded a permanent end to the war in any hostage deal, a condition that Netanyahu has rejected.