The parents of an American hostage held in Gaza said Tuesday that they “100%” support President Trump warning Hamas that “all hell is going to break out” if the remaining hostages are not returned — praising the president for not paying the terrorists’ ransom.
“People should take President Trump really seriously,” Edan Alexander’s father, Adi Alexander, told Fox News Tuesday, a day after the commander in chief’s warning.
“He doesn’t want to pay Hamas’ ransom. He doesn’t want to play the games that they started to play a couple of days ago, and we 100% support this claim,” the dad said of the terror group’s pause on releasing hostages, including his 20-year-old son.
“Everybody should be out at this point, but if not by this Saturday, at least by the end of the first phase, which is two weeks from now,” he said of the timeline Trump gave.
“It’s been too long, and it was too cruel.”
Despite their support for Trump’s stern final notice to Hamas, the 20-year-old’s mother, Yael Alexander, said she was still worried the plan could fall apart before her son gets to return to their home in Tenafly, New Jersey.
“You know, this is my son. I just want him back home. I want to hear that the release of the hostages is still going, and everything is on track,” she said.
Edan’s father expressed similar concerns, saying, “We need to be really, really cautious and supervise the execution of this deal.” Still, he hopes Trump’s team will “pass it over the finish line.”
Adi Alexander previously expressed optimism for the ceasefire deal, which would allow Israel and Hamas to pause fighting for 42 days to release women, children, men over 50 and those wounded and sick as part of a first wave of releases.
“It’s a long time coming. Enough is enough. We’ve been so close before and I’m happy that this time we’ve been able to pass it over the finish line,” Alexander told The Post last month.
Despite the optimism, Adi Alexander knew his son, who served in the Israel Defense Forces, would not be among the first freed.
Trump’s stern warning to Hamas on Monday comes after Hamas announced it was scrapping a scheduled hostage this weekend, arguing that Israel had not held up their side of the deal.
Abu Obeida, a spokesperson for Hamas’ military section, said the terror group wanted something in return for Israel allegedly breaking its cease-fire agreement.
“Hostages who were scheduled to be released next Saturday … will be postponed until further notice, and until the occupation commits to and compensates for the entitlements of the past weeks retroactively,” Obeida wrote on X.
Meanwhile, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz slammed the message as an “outright violation of the cease-fire.”
Trump’s comments also come days after he said he was looking to take control of the Gaza Strip and develop property on the territory, while moving Palestinians to neighboring countries without granting them a right of return.
