Immediately after horror reigned in Israel on October 7, when over 1,200 people were brutalized, raped, tortured, burned alive, and murdered, and over 200 other babies, children, women, men, and seniors kidnapped, reports emerged that the terror group, Hamas, was not the only bad actor.  Purportedly, other criminal gangs and even civilians — one on crutches — joined in the orgy of bloodletting, rape, torture, and butchery.

These early reports stated that hostages, not controlled by Hamas, the main perpetrator and most powerful terrorist group in Gaza, had been moved around within Gaza and sold to other terrorist groups.  This comports with Hamas’s sometimes statements that “they don’t know the whereabouts of certain hostages.” 

Hamas has now admitted that the red-haired infant, ten-month-old Kfir Bibas; his four-year-old brother, Ariel; and their parents are not in their control.  Rather, they have been moved to another location in Gaza, under the control of unidentified co-conspirators.  Hamas is using these four human souls as chess pieces in their deadly, psychotic game.

Where has the Red Cross been all this time?  Destroyed is the fiction that the Red Cross is a nonpartisan beacon of life-saving medical care.  The Red Cross has not examined a single hostage in captivity.  If it had done their proper job, Avigail Eden would not have been released with lice in her hair, and 84-year-old Elma Avraham would not have been deprived of her life-saving heart medicine and hospitalized with a body temperature of 82 degrees.  Moreover, many child hostages have been released with orthopedic and nutritional issues. 

If you think a hostage’s return is a victory for celebration — it’s not.  The hostages should never have been kidnapped in the first instance.  Their ransom is being paid for with the release of prisoners on the other side who were hell-bent on murdering civilian Israelis, by knife or mass bombing.

If you think a pause is good for the good guys (Israeli soldiers), it’s not.  Each day the war is paused gives Hamas time to hide leaders, let terrorists escape with the general Gaza population, refuel, and restock.

From early childhood, in the homes, in the schools, and in the literature, kids are raised to think of Israelis and Jews as dogs.  They are also taught that their holy mission, blessed by Allah, is to murder every single one of them.

If you think a ceasefire will solve hostilities, it won’t.  Hamas, as stated above, will not stop murdering Jews until they are obliterated.

Unfortunately, Hamas is not the only cult of death operating in Gaza — and not the only group Israeli troops must battle in Gaza!

Some of the hostages are most likely being held by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.  Islamic Jihad is a well stocked military group, the Al-Quds Brigade, and is backed by and funded by Iran.  It shares Hamas’s goal of total Israeli destruction.  Islamic Jihad is considered the second most wistful group in Gaza. 

Third on the who’s who list of powerful Gazan terrorist groups is the Popular Resistance Committees.  Their fighters took part in the October 7 attack.  They see themselves as a resistance group with close ties to Iran.

Other groups with whom the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will have to battle within Gaza are the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine; and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, which coordinates continuously with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, participated with them in the bestial October 7 attack.  Finally, there is the Palestinian Mujahideen Movement, which was cited as a terrorist organization by the United States State Department in 2018.

Hamas, as the largest and most powerful group in Gaza, is currently the IDF’s main target.

Perhaps the worst of all ironies is the tortured relationship between Israel and Yahya Sinwar.  Sinwar is the alleged planner and executor of the October 7 attacks and the leader of Hamas.  He has admitted to killing at least two suspected Israeli collaborators with his bare hands and kidnapping and killing Israeli soldiers.  At one point in his life, he was imprisoned in an Israeli jail, sentenced to four life sentences.  Yet while he was imprisoned, Israeli doctors removed a tumor in his brain, thereby saving his life.

In another fateful event, Sinwar was released from Israeli prison in 2011, along with 1,000 other Arab prisoners, in exchange for Gilad Shalit, who had been kidnapped and held by Hamas for five years.

In a heartrending, sinister act, Sinwar is reported to have visited the hostages and told them they were safe.  Yet a twelve-year-old boy hostage, just released, reported being repeatedly beaten.  Combined with other documented hostages’ deprivation, Sinwar’s assurances were not accurate.

Image: scottgunn via Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0.