An Israeli kidnapped during the Oct. 7 attack has been “murdered” in Gaza, his kibbutz and a family association said Saturday, after Palestinian Hamas reported his death in an army rescue attempt.
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“It is with great sadness and broken hearts that we announce that Sahar Baruch (25 years old) has been murdered,” the Hostage Families Forum and Kibbutz Beeri said in a statement.
This agricultural village in southern Israel, just a few kilometers from the Gaza Strip, was the scene of one of the worst massacres on Israeli soil. The attack killed 80 of 1,110 residents. Led by Hamas commandos who infiltrated from Gaza into the Gaza Strip.
Sahar Baruch was “abducted from his home by Hamas terrorists and then taken to Gaza and killed there,” the statement said, adding that his brother Idan was also killed on October 7.
The Israeli army acknowledged on Friday the failure of a hostage rescue operation in which two soldiers were seriously injured, it said.
“No hostages were rescued,” it added, without providing further details on the fate of those hostages, stressing that “many terrorists involved in the kidnapping and detention of the hostages were killed.”
AFP
Hamas's armed wing announced that it had “thwarted an Israeli attempt to rescue a hostage by spotting members of Israel's special forces sneaking into the center of the Gaza Strip” and “sliding into an ambulance.”
In a statement, it reported “heavy exchanges of fire” in which soldiers were injured and declared “one hostage dead.”
Hamas then released a video in which we see the remains of a man identified in the video as Sahar Baruch. This video could not be independently authenticated.
The Israeli government says 138 hostages are still being held in Gaza after 105 people were kidnapped in late November as part of a seven-day ceasefire, including 80 Israelis, in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
The hostages were brought to Gaza during the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israeli soil that left 1,200 people dead, mostly civilians, according to Israeli authorities.
According to the latest Hamas Health Ministry report, Israeli retaliatory bombings claimed 17,700 lives, more than two-thirds of them women and people under 18.