Strain is mounting on the Israeli authorities to discover a strategy to retrieve over 200 hostages at the moment held by the Palestinian militant group Hamas because the Israeli Protection Pressure’s floor offensive into Gaza will increase in depth. 5 hostages have now been freed — 4 launched not too long ago by Hamas, and one rescued through the Israeli floor assault.

Because the hostages’ captivity stretches on, nevertheless, divides have gotten obvious each inside Israel and amongst its companions. Households of the hostages have referred to as on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to think about an “all for all” change — buying and selling each hostage taken by Hamas for each Palestinian prisoner held by Israel. Israeli officers have mentioned they haven’t utterly dominated out the proposal, however that they imagine a army offensive is one of the best technique proper now. Netanyahu reiterated in a speech on Monday that he believes the continuing “floor motion” by Israel will create the potential of hostage rescue, just like the profitable retrieval of an IDF soldier this week.

“Hamas won’t do it until they’re beneath stress,” Netanyahu mentioned.

The deadlock follows a brutal assault by Hamas on Israel on October 7, throughout which it’s estimated to have killed 1,400 civilians along with the hostages it captured. After that incursion, the Israeli authorities retaliated by conducting devastating airstrikes on Gaza, limiting meals, water, and gasoline to the individuals who reside there, and launching a floor invasion some observers concern might result in a wider battle.

The violence in Gaza has killed over 8,000 folks, most of whom had been civilians, based on the Gaza Well being Ministry. Hamas has additionally claimed that practically 50 hostages have been killed in Israeli airstrikes, a determine that hasn’t been independently verified. One German Israeli lady beforehand believed to have been taken hostage has been confirmed to have been killed, although it’s unclear precisely when and the way she died.

There’s so much that’s nonetheless unsure in regards to the steps Hamas might take subsequent and its strategy to negotiations. Given the scenario to date, and the group’s previous practices, nevertheless, right here’s what we do learn about who the hostages are, what Hamas needs, and which events have been concerned in talks.

Who’re the hostages?

The hostages embrace greater than 200 individuals who had been captured by Hamas in Israeli border cities, at an out of doors music pageant, and at army bases on October 7. They embrace many civilians of various ages — together with older adults, a 9-month-old child, and youngsters — in addition to army service members, based on the New York Instances.

Greater than half of the hostages are believed to have overseas passports and reportedly come from 25 completely different international locations, together with Thailand, the US, Argentina, France, Germany, and Russia, based on the Israeli authorities.

The households of hostages have fought to maintain their family members a high precedence within the ongoing Israel-Hamas battle, with some forming a company referred to as the Hostages and Lacking Households Discussion board, which is devoted to pushing for his or her return.

“I’m telling my authorities — I don’t care what the worth is, you must pay it,” Lior Peri, the son of one of many hostages, instructed the Monetary Instances. “We’re ensuring that no person forgets the kidnapped and lacking folks. The ladies, youngsters, the aged,” Meirav Gonen, whose daughter is believed to have been taken hostage, instructed the Nationwide Publish. “We should maintain this situation on the forefront, not simply in our nation however all over the world.”

Gonen mentioned her daughter, Romi, 23, is somebody who “loves folks’’ and “is simply attending to know the world.” She’s amongst the hostages that had been thought to have been taken from the music pageant.

“[I] instructed her how a lot I like her and the way a lot she’s liked, and what we’ll do when she comes again house,” Gonen instructed the AP in regards to the final dialog that they had.

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Michael Levy’s brother, Or, 33, can be among the many captives and somebody he describes as an excellent pc programmer who’s “at all times smiling, at all times glad.”

Levy’s mother and father instructed the AP that Or’s 2-year-old son has been asking for his mother and father, together with his mom who was killed within the October 7 assaults, for the previous two weeks. Adva Adar’s grandmother Yaffa Adar, 85, was taken hostage on October 7 and is the “glue of our household,” Adva instructed the AP.

Many relations have confused the significance of bringing the hostages again house and urged the Israeli authorities to do extra. “I need him again now…to his house,” Miri Benami instructed Al Jazeera, about her 24-year-old son Yosef, who’s believed to have been kidnapped by Hamas.

Three of the hostages — Yelena Trupanob, Danielle Aloni, and Rimon Kirsht, based on Netanyahu — have appeared in a video launched by Hamas, although it’s unclear if the message they delivered was one in every of their very own or one thing crafted by the group. Solely Aloni speaks within the clip; her remarks blame Netanyahu and his authorities’s “political, army, and safety failure,” and advocate for Israel to launch all Palestinian prisoners in change for these held in Gaza.

Why did Hamas launch just a few of its hostages?

The hostages Hamas has launched to date are Judith Ranaan, 59, and Natalie Ranaan, 17, an American mom and daughter; and Yocheved Lifshitz, 85, and Nuri Yitzhak, 79, two Israeli residents. Throughout its floor offensive, Israel additionally freed IDF Pvt. Ori Megidish as a part of what its officers described as a particular operation.

Hamas has mentioned that it determined to launch its first hostages primarily based on “humanitarian” causes, a declare that hostage specialists dismiss as a result of the act of taking hostages is a battle crime, a violation of the Geneva Conventions, and a continuation of brutal actions the group has taken.

Extra seemingly, Hamas’s choices are primarily based on making an attempt to enhance its picture and trying to display that it’s a official associate in negotiations, says Christopher O’Leary, the previous director of hostage restoration for the US authorities and a senior vp for the Soufan Group.

If the group continues to let hostages go, it might launch civilians in batches, O’Leary theorized. And if it follows a sample Palestinian militant teams have used prior to now, Hamas has in all probability organized the hostages into teams primarily based on completely different traits — like whether or not they’re civilians, overseas nationals, or service members. Hamas will in all probability maintain Israeli troopers the longest as a result of they see them as key leverage for potential prisoner exchanges or different longer-term calls for, O’Leary guessed.

“If I used to be to take a position, I might say the following group to come back out could be ladies and youngsters, as a result of it [attempts to put] them on increased floor in comparison with the Israelis within the international group and public notion,” says O’Leary, who notes that Hamas could wish to draw a distinction with the Israeli authorities’s actions in Gaza, together with airstrikes which have killed hundreds of kids.

O’Leary additionally anticipated that Hamas would maintain overseas nationals and stagger their releases as a result of it helped to take care of stress on completely different international locations’ governments. It’s value noting that there’s nonetheless so much that we don’t learn about how the group could strategy worldwide or Israeli captives, nevertheless. In a go to to Moscow following the assault, a Hamas spokesperson Abu Marzouk instructed a Russian state information outlet that the hostages’ nationalities had been much less related in terms of negotiations: “All these captured, for us, are Israelis.” Marzouk confused Hamas wouldn’t launch overseas hostages until there was an settlement for a ceasefire.

What’s Hamas’s historical past of taking hostages?

Hamas’s latest actions are according to Palestinian militant teams’ historical past of utilizing hostage-taking as a tactic to attract consideration to their trigger and to extend leverage in negotiations with Israel. Beforehand, there have been a number of situations of teams together with Hamas taking hostages. In 2006, Hamas kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, finally exchanging him for 1,027 Palestinian prisoners in 2011.

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The group additionally captured and killed Israeli troopers in 1989 and 1994, spurring a wave of Israeli arrests of Hamas members. And in 2014, Hamas kidnapped and killed three Israeli youngsters, who the group had at one level hoped to commerce for Palestinian prisoners. That point, Israel responded with lots of of arrests together with that of plenty of Hamas leaders, and the incident fueled tensions between the 2 teams that contributed to the 2014 Gaza battle.

“Beginning within the Nineteen Sixties, and all through the Nineteen Seventies, a handful of various Palestinian militant organizations used largely airplane hijackings to take massive teams of Israelis hostage, and to demand prisoner releases and prisoner exchanges and different concessions from the Israeli authorities,” says Northwestern College political scientist Danielle Gilbert, a professor who research hostage-taking practices. “Quick-forward to the Nineteen Eighties, when militant organizations within the area began utilizing kidnapping as a selected type of hostage-taking violence, fairly than utilizing airplane hijackings.”

Gilbert says that Hamas’s choice to take hostages is a continuation of those prior practices and in addition a continuation of the group’s alleged efforts to make use of civilians as “human shields.” Hamas has typically been accused by Israel of finding its bases or launching weapons in Gaza close to or in residential areas. Lately, Israel claimed Hamas’s headquarters is situated beneath one in every of Gaza Metropolis’s essential hospitals, for instance, an accusation Hamas has refuted. On this case, Hamas may very well be utilizing the presence of hostages in Gaza’s tunnels to guard its operatives.

Within the days instantly following the October 7 assault, Hamas threatened to kill a civilian hostage each time Israel focused Gaza civilians with airstrikes “with out warning,” although it has not repeated that declare within the weeks since.

Total, it’s tough to say precisely how this hostage scenario will play out given how completely different it’s from Hamas’s previous practices, and the way a lot we don’t know. The group at the moment being held is likely one of the largest variety of hostages Hamas has ever taken, and is uncommon as a result of it contains such a variety of civilians, along with service members.

What does Hamas need in change for the hostages? What’s its longer-term technique?

Hamas seemingly has short- and long-term calls for associated to the hostages — together with some it’s publicly expressed.

Hamas is calling for extra humanitarian help to be distributed in Gaza in change for the discharge of further hostages within the close to time period. That help contains meals, water, and gasoline, the final of which has confirmed to be a barrier to an settlement as a consequence of Israeli authorities issues that it may very well be used to produce rockets and extra assaults. Hamas has additionally reportedly demanded a ceasefire in change for the discharge of extra hostages, based on the Wall Road Journal.

Israel claims Hamas has loads of gasoline to produce the folks of Gaza with. Thus far, based on the UN, roughly 12 vehicles of help per day are being allowed into Gaza, down from the roughly 500 a day that introduced items earlier than the siege.

One other of Hamas’s calls for is the discharge of Palestinian prisoners who’ve been jailed by the Israeli authorities. There are an estimated 5,000 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, together with Hamas militants. “The worth to pay for the massive variety of enemy hostages in our fingers is to empty the prisons of all Palestinian prisoners,” Hamas spokesperson Abu Obeida mentioned in a press release.

How are the hostages being handled?

The hostages launched to date have shared narratives with the general public each immediately and not directly.

Lifshitz, one of many older adults let out, has spoken in regards to the harrowing expertise of being kidnapped and held captive in one in every of Hamas’s Gaza tunnels. She says she was crushed through the kidnapping in her kibbutz of Nir Oz and pushed away on a motorcycle. “I went by way of hell,” she mentioned of the kidnapping.

Lifshitz then remembers strolling right into a maze of tunnels that she describes as a “spiderweb” and being grouped with a handful of others from her kibbutz in an space the place all of them slept on mattresses. She says that members of Hamas mentioned “they imagine the Quran and they won’t hurt us.” Lifshitz additionally mentioned she acquired meals and medical care whereas in captivity, and was handled “gently” throughout that point.

Ilia Yefimovich/DPA/Image Alliance/Getty Photos

The Ranaans’ relations have additionally spoken out about their seize and reunion, describing how their household was held up at gunpoint whereas ready on their kitchen ground. In accordance with Good Morning America, 13 members of their household had both been kidnapped or killed through the October 7 assault, and so they had been nonetheless ready to listen to in regards to the standing of lots of them.

Megidish has not spoken out publicly, however based on the IDF she is “doing effectively.”

O’Leary says he suspects that Hamas will wish to deal with the hostages effectively, each to maintain them alive, and so when they’re launched, their narratives will assist soften Hamas’s picture on the world stage following the violent killings and kidnappings it carried out on October 7.

“That is for an eventual transaction,” he notes. “So that you wish to maintain [them] wholesome, effectively fed, of comparatively respectable well being, sound of thoughts.”

He added that it was not “out of the query” that Hamas might hurt or kill hostages if the scenario worsened, however mentioned it was “unlikely” as a result of the group is concerned with sustaining the broader international assist that Palestinian rights have gained.

Who’re the important thing worldwide gamers right here and why?

The principle events concerned in these negotiations are the Israeli authorities, Hamas, Qatar, Egypt, and the US. To this point, Qatar and Egypt have performed a key function in mediating the negotiations between Hamas, and the Israeli and US governments, as each international locations have relationships with all three events. The US has no diplomatic ties with Hamas, which it considers a terrorist group.

Qatar is house to a Hamas workplace and has offered thousands and thousands of {dollars} in help to Gaza. Moreover, it has had robust ties with each the US and Israel. The nation was an essential occasion within the launch of American hostages in Afghanistan in addition to in Mali and Niger, O’Leary notes. Egypt additionally has again channels with Hamas, which it’s beforehand negotiated ceasefires with as effectively.

“Typically in ransom kidnappings … the hostage taker makes the demand, the goal responds with a a lot decrease counteroffer over an extended time frame, and so they maintain whittling away at one another’s positions till they discover a level that they’ll agree on,” says Gilbert of how the method may go. “And generally if we’re occupied with prisoner swaps, it is perhaps a protracted effort on each side to determine the quantity and the type of folks that every facet is keen to launch in change for getting their particular person or their folks house.”

Precisely how rather more Qatar and Egypt will be capable to accomplish is unclear. Israeli leaders have explicitly acknowledged they really feel a army technique is one of the best ways to free extra hostages, whereas a few of Hamas’s calls for — as famous above — have initially been rejected by Israel’s leaders.

What’s the best strategy to safe hostages’ launch?

The Biden administration reportedly mentioned and determined in opposition to making an attempt to rescue Hamas’s hostages in a US army operation, a call that seems to weigh key dangers hostage specialists have cited.

“Throughout international locations and over time, one of the best ways to recuperate hostages has at all times been by way of negotiations,” Gilbert says, “which has the next probability of bringing hostages out of captivity alive.” Whereas the strategy depends on the circumstances, together with the instant risk that hostages face, negotiations can reduce the danger each to hostages in addition to to particular forces that is perhaps concerned in a rescue effort.

The draw back of negotiation is how time-consuming the method will be in addition to the precedent such talks might set for rewarding hostage-takers for “egregious illegal conduct,” Gilbert notes.

Makes an attempt at hostage rescue, in the meantime, are sometimes riskier. Most of these missions are usually performed by particular forces operations on the bottom, however are depending on realizing the exact places of hostages. On this case, a mission like that is much more complicated given the variety of hostages and the assumption that they’re unfold out in a difficult-to-navigate collection of tunnels.

“So that you can do a profitable hostage rescue, you want intelligence and knowledge at a granular degree,” says O’Leary, of the info that’s usually required to mount a rescue mission. Whereas the US and its allies have robust data-gathering capabilities, it isn’t clear its army — or Israel’s — has ample intelligence to successfully rescue all the hostages with out rising the dangers they face.

Israeli leaders have repeatedly argued army motion is the best strategy to stress Hamas into releasing extra hostages. A number of the hostages’ households query that strategy, nevertheless, expressing concern that army operations danger additional harming the hostages in crossfire or through reprisals.

“We got here with an unequivocal demand that army motion takes under consideration the destiny of the hostages and the lacking, and that any transfer thought-about will take into consideration the well-being of our family members,” Gonen mentioned concerning a gathering between households of hostages and Israeli officers.

Israeli authorities officers have mentioned they’re targeted on pursuing all of the channels accessible, however that it views army motion as central.

“The extra army stress, the extra firepower, and the extra we strike Hamas — the higher our likelihood is to carry it to a spot the place it is going to comply with an answer that may enable the return of your family members,” Israeli protection minister Yoav Gallant has mentioned.