Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday night traded barbs with families of the remaining Gaza hostages, who accused the prime minister of scolding them while not doing enough for the release of their loved ones.
In a Tel Aviv press conference, Netanyahu rejected an accusation from a reporter that he was alienating the mediators and defended his efforts to secure the release of the hostages, amid growing criticism, particularly from the families of the captives.
At all moments, Netanyahu said, he was working to secure the release of those kidnapped in the October 7 Hamas-led attack.
Both he and his family, Netanyahu noted, had a history of acting on behalf of Israeli hostages. He explained that he was injured in 1972 when he was part of a mission to rescue the 90 passengers aboard the hijacked Sabina Flight 571. In 1976 Netanyahu’s brother Yonatan was killed rescuing hijacked Israeli from Entbee Uganda.
“So no one needs to encourage me to push for the release of the hostage, “I am working on this all the time,” he said.
But he had harsh words for the protest campaign the families of the hostages have led demanding an immediate deal, warning that their activities only played into the hands of Hamas.
“I understand that it is impossible to control one’s emotions” in this situation but it also “doesn’t help” and only “hardens Hamas’ demands and delays the results that we all want.”
Gaza hostages’ families: What if it were Netanyahu’s children?
The families’ campaign for the release of the hostages said that if they did not work publicly for the release of their loved one, they would end up like the Israeli pilot Ron Arad, who was captured in 1986 and held for two years before he disappeared and his fate remains unknown until this day. His family was also advised to stay silent so the price would not be raised and the result was that he was forgotten, the campaign stated.
The “Prime Minister should remember that he is an elected official whose job it is to correct the mistakes” that occurred on October 7 “and not to scold those whose family members were kidnapped,” the campaign stated.
If his children were “now being held by Hamas in the Gaza tunnels at the hands of despicable murderers, Mr. Netanyahu and his wife would be with us in the compound of the kidnapped families fighting for their lives,” the campaign stated.
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