23 Oct Hamas must release hostages immediately, says Israel’s education minister
ISRAEL’S education minister has called on Hamas to immediately release civilian hostages, accusing the terror group of a “war crime”.
Yoav Kisch was speaking after it emerged that the number of civilian hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza has risen to 222.
He told GB News: “This ISIS-Hamas organisation cannot stay. We will eliminate them and whatever it takes, the Israeli people are all decisive and understanding that we cannot have neighbours like this.
“We demand the immediate and unconditional release of these hostages. We’re dealing with uninvolved people, babies, kids, elderly women – it’s crazy that we even have to speak about it.
“It’s such a war crime that is even hard to imagine. So this thing has to happen immediately. We will continue our efforts to make sure that Hamas will not control Gaza.
“This is for the benefit of both Israel and the Palestinians. Hamas is the main cause for the suffering of both people.”
In a discussion with Mark Longhurst, he added: “I hope that this message will be conveyed not only to the Palestinians but also to Lebanon, Hezbollah, and Iran so they will see that whoever is trying to kill Jews because they are Jews, like they did in the Holocaust, this is not going to be an option anymore in the future.
“We must tell you that nobody’s dealing with the questions of what’s going to be after the war. We have one mission and that’s to destroy Hamas, to bring back peace to the region, peace to our people that they can go back to their homes and then be as quiet as it could be.”
“We’re not dealing with politics. We don’t think of the day after I can assure you that there’s going to be checking and investigation and everything’s going to happen, but first and before everything we have to win this war.”
Kisch added: “Israel is giving a safe path to the south. The North is the fighting zone. It’s a dangerous area and I don’t think that anyone will move into the north.
“So this is very important to say – we, unlike the Hamas-ISIS, we are separating and we’re doing whatever we can to avoid uninvolved civilian casualties.”
