2023-11-27 18:13:48
Smiling hostages thanking their guards? This is the narrative developed on social networks by accounts close to Hamas. On Sunday, the Gaza News + account relayed a video showing Sharon Avigdori, 52, and her daughter Noam, 12, two Israeli hostages released on Saturday, when they were taken into care by the Red Cross. We see the mother and her daughter waving to an armed man with a hidden face. In a second shot, both continue to greet while inside a vehicle.
This account relays videos and statements from the Al-Qassam brigades, the armed wing of Hamas. – Screenshot
“Sharon and Noam Avigdori leave Gaza with a smile and a small wave of the hand as a sign of goodbye to the Al-Qassam brigades,” we read in French on the Gaza news account in the caption of the video.
FAKE OFF
To what extent were these female hostages free in their actions? In the video, a male voice can be heard saying in English: “Keep waving,” as the two women wave in the vehicle.
The video was broadcast on X and Telegram by accounts close to Hamas. Gaza News + relays videos featuring the Al-Qassam brigades. Created in 1991, this paramilitary body is the armed wing of Hamas. The video was also broadcast to an English-speaking audience on X by Quds News Network, a media outlet close to Hamas according to the US State Department.
13 Israeli hostages released on Saturday
Sharon and Noam Avigdori were kidnapped on October 7 while visiting family in Kibbutz Beeri, in southern Israel. They are among the thirteen Israeli hostages who were released on Saturday.
A four-day truce came into effect on Friday in Gaza, allowing the entry of hundreds of humanitarian aid trucks into the Palestinian enclave. 39 hostages have been released so far, out of the 50 planned in the agreement. In exchange, 117 Palestinians detained in Israel were released. The agreement provides that 150 of them must be released.
Calls to extend the truce increased this Monday, from the head of diplomacy of the European Union and that of the Palestinian Authority. An Israeli government spokesperson offered Hamas an “option” to extend the truce and obtain the release of 50 additional hostages.
240 people of various nationalities were kidnapped on October 7. The offensive led by Israel in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the October 7 attacks caused the deaths of nearly 15,000 people, according to Hamas.
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