The United States has hailed the rescue of four hostages who after Gaza eight months in captivity have finally been reunited with their families in Israel.
Secretary of State, Antony Blinken who welcomed this development in a statement released on Saturday said, United States will not rest until every hostage is returned home.
He added that the proposal that President Joe Biden outlined eight days ago would bring relief to both the people of Gaza and the remaining hostages and their families through an immediate ceasefire that could lead to the release of all hostages.
Also, a surge of humanitarian assistance, Gaza’s reconstruction, and an enduring end to the war, reiterating that the only thing standing in the way of achieving ceasefire is Hamas, telling them to accept the deal.
Israeli forces rescued four hostages held by Hamas since October in a raid in Gaza that Palestinian officials said killed more than 200 people, one of the single bloodiest Israeli assaults of the eight-month-old war’, according to Reuter.
The hostage rescue operation and an intense accompanying air assault took place in central Gaza’s al-Nuseirat, a densely built-up and often embattled area in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian territory’s ruling Islamist group.
An Israeli military spokesperson said the operation took place in the heart of a residential neighbourhood in Nuseirat where Hamas had kept the hostages in two separate apartment blocks.
Israel’s forces came under intense fire during the assault and responded by firing “from the air and from the street,” the spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said.
“We know about under 100 (Palestinian) casualties. I don’t know how many from them are terrorists,” he said in a briefing with journalists. Also, an Israeli special forces commander was killed during the operation, a police statement said.
