Israel reiterated a new offer Monday made last week by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week: Hamas terrorists who release their Israeli hostages will be allowed to live; those who do not will be hunted down and killed.
There are 101 remaining Israeli hostages still in Hamas captivity in Gaza, about a third of whom are presumed dead.
However, the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar by Israeli troops last Wednesday has renewed hope for a hostage deal — even if it is not clear with whom Israel would be negotiating. In the vacuum, private actors have begun to step forward: Daniel Birnbaum, has made a public offer to pay $100,000 per living Israeli hostage freed by October 23.
David Mencer, an Israeli government spokesman representing the office of the prime minister, was asked in a press briefing about such private hostage release offers (some of which date to the earliest weeks of the war last October).
Without replying directly to the question, Mencer reiterated that Hamas terrorists who released Israeli hostages “without further harm” will “escape with their lives.” He reiterated that this offer had come directly rom Netanyahu.
As Breitbart News reported last Thursday, Netanyahu gave an address in Hebrew in which he said: “I am calling on everyone who is holding our hostages: whoever lays down his arms and returns our hostages, we will allow him to escape and to live. And by the same measure, I say: whoever harms our hostages, his blood will be on his own head.”
Meanwhile, Israel continues operations in both Gaza and southern Lebanon, rooting out terrorists in the latter and seizing weapons caches in the latter. Israel also launched airstrikes against Hezbollah financing centers on Sunday.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
