Gaza Strip | Trudeau demands release of Israeli hostages held by Hamas

(Toronto) Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Sunday demanded the release of hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and called for the terrorist group to lay down its arms.

In a post on the social network X, Justin Trudeau began by calling the recent murder of six Israeli hostages “devastating and revolting,” before writing that “Hamas must release all hostages and lay down its arms.”

The prime minister added that Hamas “has no future in governing Gaza. The leadership must reach an agreement to repatriate the remaining hostages and end the violence.”

The Canadian government has strongly condemned the killing of the six hostages. “Canada unequivocally condemns the killing of six innocent Israeli hostages by Hamas terrorists in Gaza. I extend my deepest condolences to their families and loved ones,” Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly wrote earlier in the day on X. “Hamas must release all hostages and we continue to call for an immediate ceasefire. The violence must stop.”

Mayan Shavit was initially incredulous when rumors surfaced on social media that her cousin was dead. Carmel Gat had, after all, recently been seen by some of her fellow Israeli hostages doing yoga to cheer her up during the months she spent in Hamas captivity.

But M’s hopes^me Shavit’s hopes for her cousin’s survival were shattered when she saw reports confirming that she was among six hostages whose bodies were recovered by the Israeli army in Gaza on Saturday, shortly after they were killed.

M^me Shavit, who lives in Toronto, said she is struggling with both anger and grief after learning of Carmel Gat’s fate.

“I can’t stop crying, I can’t understand. I’m very angry,” she said in a telephone interview, adding that she planned to travel to Israel on Monday to attend his funeral.

The terrorist group took more than 200 hostages in the October 7 attack that sparked the ongoing war. More than 1,200 Israelis were killed, including one of M’s aunts.^me Shavit.

Israel has been fighting back ever since, and health officials in Gaza say the 11 months of war that followed killed more than 40,000 people, two-thirds of them women and children.

The release of the hostages has been a key issue in internationally-led peace talks to end the war, with Hamas pledging to free all hostages if Israel stops its attacks on Gaza and releases hundreds of prisoners. Israel insists it will not stop until Hamas is destroyed.

M^me Shavit said the circumstances of her cousin’s abduction remained unknown for months, and only became clear when a group of hostages were freed and reported seeing her alive and well.

“They told us she was safe and sound and that no one had touched her or anything horrible like that,” she said.

Carmel Gat was a yoga instructor, her cousin said, and continued the practice regularly in captivity. Hostages who were freed during a lull in hostilities in November also said she taught them meditation and yoga exercises to help them survive.

The Israeli Health Ministry said autopsies determined that M^me Gat and the five other hostages were shot at close range and died on Thursday or Friday. The army said the bodies were recovered from a tunnel in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, about a kilometer (0.6 miles) from where another hostage was rescued last week.

The deaths of six hostages sparked a wave of protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets of Jerusalem to demand that he reach a ceasefire agreement and secure the immediate release of the remaining hostages.

M’s sadness^me Shavit, after her cousin’s death, is mixed with anger toward both sides. She says she blames Hamas for holding the hostages and starting the war, while pointing the finger at Mr. Netanyahu for not doing enough as the country’s prime minister to protect and bring home those held captive.

She said the time to end the conflict and bring back the hostages was long over.

“It’s better to stop, because it’s a lose-lose situation for all parties,” she explained. “No one will come out a winner from this situation.”