CNN
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s wife Sara has been overheard on a microphone saying that “fewer” than 24 hostages are still alive in Gaza, outraging hostages’ families who demanded to know what the government knows about the fate of their loved ones
“We have of course an important task, not only to win but also to bring home (the hostages),” Netanyahu said at a meeting with Israeli holiday torchbearers on Monday. “Until today we have returned 196 of our hostages, 147 of whom were alive. There are… up to 24 living. Up to 24 living.”
“Fewer,” Sara Netanyahu interrupted quietly, seated to her husband’s right.
“I say up to,” Netanyahu quickly responded. “And the rest are, I’m sorry to say, not alive. And we will return them.”
There are currently 59 hostages remaining in Gaza. Israel has publicly said in recent weeks that it believes up to 24 of those are still alive. The short exchange appears to be an indication that the Israeli government may have information that some of the 24 hostages have died.
Israeli officials told CNN last week there are “grave concerns” about three of the hostages but would not say whether Israel knows for certain that they are dead. For months, Israeli officials used the same language to refer to hostages Shiri Bibas and her two children, whose bodies were returned in the most recent ceasefire.
The group representing the hostages’ families slammed Netanyahu and his wife.
“On the eve of Memorial Day, you sowed indescribable panic in the hearts of the families of the hostages – families already living in agonizing uncertainty,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said in a statement. “If there is intelligence or new information regarding the condition of our loved ones, we demand full disclosure.” asking why the wife of the prime minister has sensitive information about their loved ones that they do not.
“If the wife of the prime minister has new information about the kidnapped who were killed, I demand from her to know if my Matan is still alive, or if he was murdered in captivity because your husband refuses to finish the war,” Einav Zangauker, the mother of one of the hostages, said on social media.
