Hamas has released a new propaganda video showing three young women kidnapped from Israel on Oct. 7 and still being held in Gaza, just as press reports say Israel and Hamas may be near an agreement to halt fighting and release the hostages.
Two 19-year-old women doing their national service in the Israeli Army, Karina Ariev and Daniela Gilboa, who were both kidnapped from an Israeli army base in Nahal Oz, were joined in the video by Doron Steinbrecher, a 31-year-old kidnapped from her home in the kibbutz Kfar Aza.
The women are among about 100 hostages who remain in captivity. Hamas is also holding the bodies of two to three dozen hostages who died in captivity, Israel believes. The video appears to have been on Sunday, as the hostages speak about being in captivity for "107 days,” Israeli media reports say.It was released in the hours after the UN's top court called on Hamas and its affiliates to release all the remaining hostages
Ariev and Gilboa were two of the four hostages whose bloodstained faces appeared in the press in recent weeks, in photos that were reportedly taken during their captivity in Gaza.
The parents of Doron Steinbrecher, who is thought to be in desperate need of medication, met with representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross last month, but were reportedly reprimanded by the aid group.
While she was in captivity, Gilboa’s boyfriend proposed to her by asking her parents for her hand in marriage, the fiance’s father told the newspaper Ma’ariv.
The fiance’s father, who was not identified, told the news site that the video gave Gilboa’s family “hope and real happiness” to see that she is alive and in reasonably good health.
“She looks strong, so it encourages all of us,” he said.