The hostages are not Netanyahu’s priority

Netanyahu uses the hostages as a reason to murder more Palestinians

While Labour backs and supports genocide, Israel’s horrors continue to escalate in Palestine.

On Monday morning Israeli forces bombed Nuseirat refugee camp and the northern Gaza City, killing at least sixteen people. An attack on the al-Sumoud camp in al-Mawasi kill another five people.

Israeli forces have consistently targeted Nuseirat. In June, Israel launched a massive raid of Nuseirat to recover four captives that were being held there. But the operation was a massacre, not a recovery mission.

Covered by bombs falling and warships firing from the sea, Israeli forces killed at least 274 Palestinians. Israel claimed the massacre was a success as four hostages were recovered.

In reality, its “success” stemmed from the murder of hundreds of Palestinians. Israel seems not to care about Israeli hostages.

It has recently come to light that Israel is killing the very hostages it is supposed to be rescuing. In December last year, Israel recovered the bodies of three Israeli hostages, who were found dead in a tunnel.

At the time, Israel blamed the deaths on Hamas, which the Palestinian resistance group denied.

Now, in a comprehensive report released last week, it is confirmed that Israel itself killed the hostages. The deaths were a “by-product” of an airstrike that killed Hamas’s northern Gaza brigade chief, Ahmed al-Ghandour, in November.

The findings highlight something which has always been clear—Israel is using the question of the hostages as cover to continue its genocide of Palestinians.

Hassan Barrari, professor of international affairs at Qatar University said, “Now it’s obvious that the more the Israelis will fight, the riskier it will become for the captives.”

But there are rising tensions in Israel. Protests erupted against Binyamin Netanyahu at the start of September after the deaths of six Israelis held by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

Netanyahu responded to the pressure by vowing more murders.

And the demonstrations failed to challenge the basis of the Zionist state that oppresses and exploits Palestinians. It’s a genocidal regime—and the Labour Party is committed to it.