Hamas releases video of Israeli detained in Gaza since 2014
Israeli prisoner Avera Mengistu appeared in a Hamas video on January 16, 2023. Hamas via REUTERS - Hamas
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1 min
The Palestinian Islamist movement did not choose the broadcast date by chance.
It coincides with the change of the Chief of Staff in Israel.
Hamas thus blames the number one in the army, who has just left his post, for the failure to free this Israeli citizen.
The Palestinian group is thus putting pressure on the Jewish state, in order to conclude a prisoner exchange agreement.
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With our correspondent in Jerusalem,
Sami Boukhelifah
The video released by the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, lasts less than a minute.
A man appears who introduces himself as “
the prisoner Avera Mengistu
”.
"
How much longer am I going to stay here, in prison?"
“, he asks.
“
After long and painful years, where are the State and the people of Israel
?
Do they care about our fate
?
»
“
Our fate
”, because Avera Mengistu is not the only Israeli citizen in the hands of Hamas.
The Palestinian armed movement also holds another prisoner, as well as the remains of two Israeli soldiers.
“
Israel […] is making every effort to bring home its captive and missing sons,
” the prime minister’s office responded.
According to the Israeli authorities, Avera Mengistu is mentally unstable.
In September 2014, he was filmed by an Israeli security camera as he scaled the fence separating Israel from Gaza.
Through the publication of this new video, Hamas hopes to conclude a prisoner exchange agreement with the Jewish state.
In 2011, Israel released more than a thousand Palestinians in exchange for Gilad Shalit, a Franco-Israeli soldier, then detained by Hamas.
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