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Hamas official: We’re holding 30 IDF soldiers hostage

Hamas official trumpets number of captive soldier, yet fails to specify whether they were captured alive or dead.

By World Israel News Staff

A senior Hamas official said that the terror group is holding some 30 Israeli soldiers hostage in the Gaza Strip, as Qatari-brokered ceasefire negotiations have stalled.

The official, who was not named in the New Arab report, said that Hamas had “captured” 30 soldiers on October 7th.

Notably, the official did not comment regarding whether the soldiers were captured alive or dead, nor did he state whether any are still alive or deceased.

The soldiers are “being held in high-security locations, and are very far from the hand of the occupation [Israel],” the official told the New Arab.

He added that it would be “impossible” for Israel to carry out a rescue operation to free them.

Earlier in April, senior Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk said that Hamas does “not know how many Israeli prisoners are alive or dead at the moment.”

Since the October 7th onslaught, Hamas has trumpeted the total number of captives, without specifying the condition of the hostages.

Hamas has refused to reveal critical details about the status of the hostages, withholding that information as a bargaining chip during ongoing ceasefire negotiations.

In March, another Hamas official, Basem Naim, told AFP that “we don’t know exactly who’s alive or dead” and claimed a ceasefire was needed in order for the terror group to ascertain that information.

It’s unclear how many of those listed as hostages on October 7th were kidnapped while they were alive. Many of the families of the hostages were initially told their relatives were live hostages, when they were in fact already dead when their bodies were seized by Hamas.

One young man, Jonathan Samerano, was murdered at a kibbutz after fleeing the Nova Festival massacre. His body was kidnapped by an UNRWA employee driving an official UN vehicle.

However, despite security footage from the kibbutz depicting Samerano being shot and his lifeless body dragged away, his family was not informed that he was killed until months later.