What are they even hoping to get out of keeping the hostages anymore? At this point it looks like Israel is quietly trying to move to acting as though they’re already dead anyways.
The hostages are something of value to someone, even if that value is almost nothing to the major players.
And it isn’t like Israel is quietly trying to act as if there aren’t hostages any more, they’ve been acting like it since near the beginning of this war, which I feel caught Hamas by surprise.
What are they even hoping to get out of keeping the hostages anymore?
They won’t get anything from handing them over, so when everything is over it might get Gaza a few more kilometers of land.
They won’t get anything from handing them over
I guess Allah doesn’t reward people just for doing the right thing then?
Throwing away all your leverage in war isn’t “the right thing”.
Holding civilians hostage for 3 months isn’t “war”, it’s an act of terrorism and a war crime.
Edit: I see I struck a nerve with that one.
It is since Israel made hostages one of the few ways Palestinians can actually do anything to improve their lives.
hostages one of the few ways Palestinians can actually do anything to improve their lives
Genuine question, how has Hamas taking hundreds of innocent people hostage on October 7th improved the situation in Gaza or Israel in any way? Whose life is better today than it was a couple of months ago as a result?
International humanitarian law prohibits taking and executing hostages. Such acts are considered war crimes (GCI–IV Common Art. 3; GCIV Arts. 34, 147; API Art. 75) and can be tried before any national court, under the principle of universal jurisdiction.
The Convention defines a hostage taker as “any person who seizes or detains and threatens to kill, to injure or to continue to detain another person (‘hostage’) in order to compel a third party, namely a State, an international inter-governmental organization, a natural or juridical person, or a group of persons, to do or to abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition for the release of the hostage, commits the offence of taking hostages (‘hostage taking’)” (Art. 1 of Hostage Convention).
The Convention further specifies that not only those who commit such an act but also any person who attempts to commit or who participates as an accomplice in such an act or attempt is accountable and must be punished.
At any rate, regardless of whether you feel Hamas’ jihad is justified or not (it isn’t, in fact), hostage taking is an international war crime. The Geneva Convention is the bare minimum standard on this, and as such our opinions and political leanings are irrelevant.
The bare minimum Hamas can do now is to release the remaining hostages and surrender themselves to the IDF to stand trial, so that the innocent people of Gaza can start slowly putting their lives back together.
Genuine question, how has Hamas taking hundreds of innocent people hostage on October 7th improved the situation in Gaza or Israel in any way? Whose life is better today than it was a couple of months ago as a result?
Nobody’s but when the war ends the number of hostages Hamas has will be an important factor in just how fucked Gaza will be.
The bare minimum Hamas can do now is to release the remaining hostages and surrender themselves to the IDF to stand trial, so that the innocent people of Gaza can start slowly putting their lives back together.
Yep, just showed your true colors. In that case Israel should also be surrendering its leadership and soldiers to stand trial in the Hague for genocide (or at the very least collective punishment).
Israel (specifically Netanyahu) has repeatedly stated they want security control of Palestine “from the river to the sea”. Nothing good is gonna come out of the Gazan resistance surrendering.
if your leverage is holding innocent people captive, maybe you aren’t the good guys?
World peace
Breaking, Hamas leaders announce cover of “we are the world”
Israel can’t stop till the hostages are back and hamas wants as many Palestinians dead as possible for propaganda. They’ll never return them willingly.
I would be surprised if hostages turn up in Egypt and Iran too to try to expand the war.
