ISRAEL – The group representing Israel’s hostages and their families has released a video showing the kidnapping of three Israelis by Hamas on October 7, shortly after the group condemned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s suggestion that Israel could strike a “partial deal” with the militant group to free some, but not all, of the hostages. The video, released Monday evening by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, shows Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Or Levy and Eliya Cohen in the back of a pickup truck, being driven along a tree-lined road in southern Israel by militants wielding assault weapons. “Here are the dogs, here they are,” one of the gunmen can be heard saying.

Goldberg-Polin, an American-Israeli citizen then aged 23, can be seen with his face bloodied and what appears to be bone protruding from his left arm  blown off after a grenade was tossed into the bunker in which he and several others had been hiding from Hamas gunmen. Hamas released a video of Goldberg-Polin in April, the first proof that he survived the blast. In the video, he criticized Netanyahu’s government, as other Israeli hostages in Hamas propaganda videos have done. Held in Gaza for six months at the time, he was almost certainly speaking under duress.

The video was released a day after Netanyahu, in his first one-on-one interview with local Israeli media since October 7, said he was ready to make “a partial deal with Hamas to return some hostages still being held captive in Gaza  an apparent softening of one of Israel’s war aims that drew a sharp rebuke from the hostages’ Forum, which has become a potent political force in Israel.Netanyahu’s comments to Israel’s Channel 14 were at odds with the aims of a broader Israeli ceasefire proposal outlined by US President Joe Biden last month, which sets out conditions intended to release all remaining hostages, in return for a permanent ceasefire and withdrawal of Israeli forces. This harrowing footage stands as a damning testament to the 262-day-long abandonment of our loved ones. Hersh, Eliya, and Or were taken alive, and they must return alive, today. Every day that passes puts the hostages at greater risk and diminishes our chances of bringing them back safely, the Forum said in a statement, calling for a deal that brings all of the hostages home. (CNN)…[+]