As Avraham Munder’s wooden casket was lowered into the Nir Oz earth at sunset earlier this week, his family’s fury and exasperation with Israel’s government and its prime minister appeared to overtake their grief.
“You could have been returned alive and been redeemed from … the physical and psychological pain inhumane conditions in which you were held in captivity, if only the prime minister and ministers had acted with political honesty and empathy and not sacrificed you,” his daughter Keren told mourners at his graveside.
“[Our] dear father … was abandoned again and again by the prime minister and his ministers in the Hamas tunnels,” she said.
Munder, who was 79 when he was abducted on Oct. 7, 2023, was last seen alive by fellow captives in March. His wife, Ruti, daughter Keren and grandson Ohad were all abducted from Nir Oz and taken to Gaza during the Hamas attacks that killed some 1,200 people — but while the others were released as part of a hostage/detainee swap in November, Avraham Munder remained a captive.
Munder was known to have been injured when he was dragged out of Nir Oz on a militant’s motorcycle, but his family had reason to believe he was still alive until their hopes were crushed on Monday. Israel’s military announced its soldiers had retrieved the bodies of six hostages near Khan Younis, and among them was Munder’s.
“We know that he was alive in March, meaning he survived five months, even in terrible conditions,” his nephew Eyal Mor told CBC News after the funeral.
“During these five months there were multiple chances to sign a deal and rescue the ones that could be rescued. I feel like he was betrayed.”
Israel’s military said Thursday that the bodies of all six hostages had shown evidence of gunshot wounds and while the exact circumstances of their death have not been determined.
Roughly 100 Israeli hostages are still thought to be unaccounted for in Gaza.
For 10 months, their families have protested, held vigils and travelled the world trying to push Israel’s government and its allies — especially the United States — to make their return the top priority.
“The recovery of six bodies is no achievement,” the Hostages Families Forum Headquarters said earlier this week. “It is a testimony of the complete failure to reach a deal in time.”
Diplomatic obstructions
In the aftermath of Israel’s assassination of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh in Iran last month and the threat of a major military response by Iran’s government, the intensity of the diplomatic efforts to reach a ceasefire picked up — only to abruptly cool down again in recent days after opponents accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of adding new conditions to a potential deal.
Statements from Netanyahu’s office suggest the latest impediment to an agreement is whether Israel will maintain a presence along the southern border of Gaza, known as the Philadelphi corridor.
The zone runs the full 14 km width of the territory and, under arrangements agreed with Egypt two decades ago, Israeli military units are not permitted in the border area.
Along with Hamas, Egypt’s government has remained adamant that should still be the case after a ceasefire.
In a statement Wednesday, Netanyahu’s office said withdrawing the IDF from the area, which it has occupied during the war, is a non-starter.
“Israel will insist on the achievement of all of its objectives for the war, as they have been defined by the security cabinet, including that Gaza never again constitutes a security threat to Israel. This requires securing the southern border,” said a statement.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has intensified efforts to secure a peace deal between Israel and Hamas, as an Israeli strike on a Gaza school killed at least 12 Palestinians, according to the Civil Defence authority.
Anguished families
Eyal Mor, Munder’s nephew, believes whether Hamas has truly been defeated or whether there are legitimate security reasons for holding up a ceasefire deal is irrelevant.
He says all of the delays are corroding the trust between Israelis and their government and it’s time to say enough is enough.
“I’m upset about the decisions of the government,” said Mor.
“Assets like the Philadelphi route are not strategic assets — strategic assets are the values of Israel. If you leave, you can always reoccupy the land but if we lose those values, what will we be left with?” he told CBC News.
His sentiment was amplified in a powerful editorial by a former ombudsman of the IDF, Yitzhak Brik.
Writing in Haaretz, Brik said that by putting new conditions on the negotiating table just when a deal is near, Netanyahu is leading Israel to a “catastrophe,” that the delay in securing a ceasefire and freeing the remaining hostages is costing the country its “social resilience” and stoking hatred between groups within the country.
As the latest round of negotiations falters, Hamas and some Arab states have accused the United States of failing to put enough pressure on Netanyahu to wring out the necessary concessions.
In public statements, Hamas officials have said the current position of Israel and the United States concerning the presence of Israeli troops in Gaza represents a “reversal” of its earlier commitments.
In Gaza, where Israeli attacks on Hamas militants and civilian targets have laid to waste vast tracts of the territory and killed more than 40,000 people according to local health authorities, the United Nations says an immediate pause in the war is imperative to address multiple unfolding calamities.
On Friday, the World Health Organization confirmed the first case of polio in a 10-month old Palestinian baby, a viral disease that had not been registered in Gaza for 25 years, but now amid the deplorable health and sanitation conditions in the territory has returned.
“Polio will not make the distinction between Palestinian and Israeli children,” wrote Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) on social media.
“Delaying a humanitarian pause will increase the risk of spread.”
United Nations Secretary General António Guterres demanded an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militants during an emergency virtual meeting of the Security Council, while the United States said it is also negotiating for an end to hostilities.
Mass displacements
Compounding the health crisis have been orders from Israel’s military for hundreds of thousands of people in Gaza to uproot from previously designated “safe areas” in cities such as Deir Al Balah.
Muhannad Hadi, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territories, says forcing so many people to move multiple times amounts to depriving them of the necessities of life.
“Imagine if you asked the population of Toronto – three million people – to move to just 11 percent [of the space of] Toronto’s city. And to keep them there for 10 months with no access to proper bathrooms, no proper medical service, no shelter, no electricity. How would these people feel? That is what they are facing,” Hadi told CBC News in a Zoom interview from Amman, Jordan.
In Gaza, a videographer working for CBC News saw scenes of desperation as thousands fled cities such Khan Younis without knowing where they were headed.
“Every day they promise us negotiations and it’s all lies, on lies, on lies,” Umm Hani Zaqout said as she packed up her belongings.
“They have meetings and discussions in the middle of the night and we’re eating shit,” she said.
At least 50 Palestinians – including many children – were killed in Israeli attacks over a 24 hour period in Khan Younis and Deir al Balah this week, even as the ceasefire talks continued.
“We are so desperate hoping for some good news,” said the UN’s Hadi.
“Sometimes I feel like I am a patient with a terminal illness waiting for my medical results to come out: am I going to live or not? Will there be a ceasefire or not?”
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