Just a reminder: A cease-fire agreement doesn’t make Hamas any less evil, even if they’re releasing hostages.
After a hold-up on Sunday, the fragile agreement ending the 15-month Israel-Hamas war took effect, with the first group of three hostages taken by the terror group during the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks being handed over from their captivity in Gaza.
The three female hostages were 24-year-old Romi Gonen, a waitress who was taken from the music festival the terrorists slaughtered their way through; Doron Steinbrecher, a 31-year-old Israeli-Romanian veterinary nurse taken from her apartment on a kibbutz; and Emily Tehila Damari, a 28-year-old British-Israeli woman taken from the same kibbutz.
“Their faces are well known in Israel, where posters calling for them to be brought home line streets, highways and bridges,” The Wall Street Journal noted.
“In Tel Aviv, people gathered at a plaza dubbed Hostage Square holding pictures of the three women as they waited for word of their release and watched it live on a large screen. As footage of the women appeared on the screen, many in the crowd began to cry.”
For swapping the three innocent women, 90 Palestinian prisoners were to be released by Israel, just in case you’d forgotten how unbalanced this agreement really was.
And in case you thought the release was any better, consider the “gift bag” the women received as a parting reminder of their captivity.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the bags included photos from the terrorists.
“Hamas gave the survivors ‘certificates of release,’ and made them pose and smile with them before the women were transferred to Red Cross custody.
Hamas made a propaganda film about the release of the three women they kidnapped over a year ago. They gave them ‘gift bags’ with certificates inside. Like they were on a student exchange from Hell. This is one of the SICKEST things I’ve ever seen. Monsters. pic.twitter.com/iuqlmi8D0c
— Heidi Bachram 🎗️ (@HeidiBachram) January 19, 2025
“The representatives of the Red Cross that collected the three women signed the documents, as seen in the video.”
The bag included “memoirs” such as a map of the Gaza Strip, photos of them while they were in captivity, and other certificates.
The certificates included a “release decision” inscription.
All three women called the bags a “cynical game,” which is an understatement of the highest degree.
And that wasn’t the only outrage. Consider the fact that even up to the moment of release, their captors still subjected the women to terror, forcing them to run a gauntlet of minatory pro-Hamas revelers:
Hamas is pure evil. https://t.co/bbSPeLSeoc
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) January 19, 2025
So, just to make the sequence of events clear: After 15 months of captivity in which the women were kidnapped, starved, psychologically tortured, and heaven knows what else — that sordid information will doubtlessly become available in the weeks to come — Hamas and/or its allies decided that these women needed a “gift bag” to remind them of over 460 days of pure hell.
Should Israel finish obliterating Hamas once all the hostages have been freed?
Yes: 98% (113 Votes)
No: 2% (2 Votes)
And for that act of “diplomacy,” 90 Palestinian prisoners — who generally weren’t just arrested for laughs, mind you — were released.
If you need anything that tells you how poxed this deal is, that’s it. Imagine this being done to your mother, sister, or daughter. You’d demand the barbarians who did it were wiped out. If Hamas isn’t at least removed from power in Gaza permanently and its leaders held to account for their crimes, this cease-fire agreement is clearly doomed from the get-go.
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