What number of hostages are in Gaza? Monitoring these freed, killed and remaining.

It has been greater than two years because the lethal Hamas assault of Oct. 7, 2023, through which militants killed round 1,200 folks in Israel and took one other 251 hostages.

Greater than half of the hostages have been freed or rescued. The ultimate 20 remaining dwelling hostages have been launched Oct. 13 as a part of a ceasefire and hostages-for-prisoners change deal between Hamas and Israel.

Israel has confirmed the identities of greater than a dozen deceased hostages whose our bodies Hamas returned beneath the deal, together with Asaf Hamami, Oz Daniel and Israeli American citizen Omer Neutra, whose our bodies have been launched on Nov. 2.

Hamas has warned that it will be tough to find the our bodies of many remaining hostages as a result of destruction within the Gaza Strip, and mentioned it should require particular tools to seek out and retrieve the stays of these nonetheless held within the Palestinian enclave.

The cross-border assault that Hamas militants launched on Oct. 7, 2023, is considered the deadliest and most brutal assault in Israeli historical past. Palestinian militants shot, bombed and burned their manner via Israeli cities, army posts and a music competition, killing and in some instances torturing 1,200 folks — together with greater than 300 troopers — and taking 251 others hostage, in line with the Israeli authorities.

In response, Israel launched a army marketing campaign towards Hamas in Gaza, in what the U.N. human rights company has described as an “unprecedented stage of killing and damage of civilians.” Greater than 68,000 Palestinians — about 3 p.c of Gaza’s inhabitants — have been killed and greater than 170,000 have been wounded because the begin of the battle, in line with the Gaza Well being Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants.

There was temporary progress in releasing the hostages in late 2023 amid mounting stress from their households and Israel’s worldwide allies, significantly america. Below an change deal that started Nov. 24, 2023, Hamas launched 78 hostages in change for 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, all of them ladies or youngsters; 24 international nationals and three Israeli Russian twin nationals have been launched outdoors of that settlement throughout the identical interval.

The U.S. pushed for a broader deal that will have encompassed the discharge of males and army personnel, however negotiations broke down and hostilities resumed Dec. 1, 2023.

Below the preliminary part of a ceasefire deal that started in January this yr, Israel freed practically 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees in change for the discharge of 25 Israeli hostages — together with two held in Gaza for a few decade — and the our bodies of eight others. 5 Thai hostages have been launched outdoors of the deal.

The ultimate dwelling hostages have been resulting from be launched throughout a deliberate second part of the settlement, however the ceasefire collapsed in March as Israel resumed assaults on Gaza. In Could, Hamas launched Edan Alexander, an Israeli American who served within the Israel Protection Forces, as a goodwill gesture following talks with the Trump administration.

On Oct. 8, Hamas and Israel reached a deal, brokered by the U.S., to launch all of the surviving hostages and the stays of all others held by Hamas, together with the physique of an Israeli soldier killed in 2014. The releases started the next week, although not the entire our bodies have been returned.

In return, Israel launched 250 Palestinians serving life sentences and about 1,700 Gaza residents held with out cost since Oct. 7, 2023.

Lots of the hostage deaths that Israel introduced all through the conflict have been confirmed throughout forensic and different investigations to have occurred within the Oct. 7 assault; the our bodies have been taken into Gaza. Israel mentioned others have been killed by militants throughout captivity.

Israel has mentioned at the least three hostages have been killed in its personal operations and mentioned that it was “extremely doubtless” that at the least three others have been killed “because of a by-product of an IDF airstrike” in late 2023. Hamas has mentioned that Israeli strikes additionally killed different hostages, though The Washington Publish couldn’t independently confirm this.

Whereas Hamas was thought to carry many of the hostages, some have been believed to be held by different militant teams, together with Islamic Jihad, whose fighters additionally took half within the Oct. 7 assault.