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Israeli safety forces mentioned early Monday that they’d rescued two hostages who had been being held within the southern Gazan metropolis of Rafah, in one of many few examples of a profitable hostage rescue in Gaza because the begin of the conflict.
The hostages, Fernando Simon Marman, 60, and Louis Har, 70, had been present process assessments at a hospital in Tel Aviv and had been each in good situation, in response to a joint assertion from the Israeli navy, the police and the home safety company, Shin Bet.
“Fernando and Louis, welcome residence,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mentioned in a press release. “I salute our courageous fighters for the daring motion that led to their launch.”
The navy’s assertion concerning the hostage rescue was issued across the identical time that it mentioned it had performed a “wave” of assaults on Rafah, a crowded metropolis on the border with Egypt the place greater than one million Palestinian refugees are anxiously anticipating an Israeli floor invasion. The navy mentioned later that the strikes had been a diversion to allow its troopers to free the hostages. The Gazan well being ministry mentioned that the strikes had killed not less than 67 Palestinians.
Mr. Marman and Mr. Har had been amongst greater than 240 individuals captured in the course of the shock Oct. 7 raid on southern Israel by Hamas and different militant teams, which later prompted Israel to retaliate with huge airstrikes and a floor invasion in Gaza. The assertion mentioned the 2 males had been captured from Nir Yitzhak, close to the Gaza border. No different particulars had been instantly obtainable.
Israel has been discussing plans to ship troops into Rafah, whilst assist teams, the United Nations and the United States have warned that the individuals sheltering there have nowhere to go. Egypt has up to now refused to absorb Palestinian refugees.
About 100 of the hostages taken in October had been launched throughout a weeklong cease-fire final November. Last week, The New York Times reported that Israeli intelligence officers had concluded that not less than 30 of the remaining 136 hostages had died because the begin of the conflict. Before Monday’s operation, Israeli forces had mentioned they rescued not less than one hostage.
Hostages’ households have been urgent Israel to prioritize negotiations for his or her launch. Last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly rejected Hamas’s newest proposal of one other pause in combating that may enable for a few of the hostages being held by the militants to be launched.
But Israeli officers have additionally signaled that their authorities was nonetheless open to negotiation, and Mr. Netanyahu mentioned in an interview televised on Sunday that his authorities was engaged on a plan to evacuate individuals from Rafah.
Asked in the course of the interview with ABC News how most of the remaining hostages had been nonetheless alive, Mr. Netanyahu mentioned, “Enough to warrant the type of efforts that we’re doing.”
“We are going to strive do our greatest to get all those that are alive again and, frankly, the our bodies of the dead,” he added.
