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Dear A.,
Hamas is continuing to
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delay returning all the bodies of the murdered hostages that it's holding in Gaza, failing to uphold its commitments under the recent agreement.
One of the four bodies handed over by Hamas last night
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did not even belong to an Israeli hostage, an Israeli forensic analysis found.
IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir
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made clear that Israel "will not rest until we return all [of the hostages], this is our moral, national and Jewish duty... we will insist and stand firm on upholding all the agreements."
President Trump has continued to demand that Hamas fully comply with the agreement, including by returning all the bodies and disarming.
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When asked what would happen if Hamas refuses to disarm, Trump
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said clearly : "If they don’t disarm, we will disarm them, and it’ll happen quickly and perhaps violently, but they will disarm."
Meanwhile, as Israel has withdrawn from parts of Gaza in compliance with the agreement, Hamas has been carrying out waves of
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executions against Palestinians who opposed the terror group.
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In a
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statement today, CENTCOM commander Admiral Brad Cooper called on Hamas to "immediately suspend violence and shooting at innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza" and comply with the peace plan.
Yet some of Israel's harshest critics in Congress are suddenly
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silent as Palestinian civilians are being openly massacred by Hamas.
The
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anti-Israel Squad in Congress only seems to care about Palestinians when they can blame Israel.
Those who truly care about peace and a better future for all the inhabitants of the Middle East should condemn Hamas and increase the pressure on the terror group to fully comply with the ceasefire agreement.
MUST WATCH
Netanyahu: Israel giving "peace a chance"
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Prime Minister Netanyahu sat down for an interview the CBS following the return of the living hostages.
Freed hostages share horrors of captivity
The hostages recently freed from Hamas captivity are beginning to share more about the horrors they suffered at the hands of the terror group.
Elkana Bohbot was
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kept in chains in an underground terror tunnels for nearly two years, now suffering injuries as a result.
Avinatan Or was handcuffed to a cage for a year after he made an escape attempt and was beaten by his captors. "He was handcuffed to the bars. It was a barred place 1.8 meters high, and the length of it was the length of the mattress, plus a little. You can call it a cage," his father
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said .
The father of freed hostage Yosef Chaim Ohana
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said , "They were tortured in ways the army had never imagined."
The horrifying details align with testimonies from previously released Israeli hostages of the
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severe abuse inflicted on them by Hamas.
Now free from two years in hell, the recently released hostages and their families are posting videos that are inspiring the nation. Omri Miran dancing with his wife and two young daughters and Evyatar David playing the song "Let There Be Light," are two of countless videos being shared.
Their remarkable resilience showcases the spirit of the Israeli people, celebrating life and embracing one another.
Included below are a few of these posts and I encourage you to
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follow our social media to see more.
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John Spencer: "What I Saw in Gaza in the Final Days of War"
Urban warfare expert John Spencer spent the days before the hostage release agreement inside Gaza speaking directly with IDF soldiers, and
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wrote about his experience in The Wall Street Journal.
"I had no idea that I may have been with them during the last day of major fighting in the war. They discussed how they succeeded in moving civilians out of harm’s way, removing Hamas’s main weapon... Most palpable was that they were optimistic the military pressure was working—not because they were intent on ‘genocide,’ but because the thought of going home, with all the hostages returned, made them happy."
"Now the ‘cease-fire now’ crowds are silent. The commentators who rebuked Israel’s strategy, urged the nation to abandon its hostages and compromise its borders and declared it impossible to defeat Hamas were wrong. It took an act of force, strength and clarity of will, denying Hamas any hope of achieving its goals."
"Of the thousands of reasons Israel wasn’t committing genocide or ethnic cleansing, this moment is proof enough. Israel is joyous over a deal that ends the war with no ethnic cleansing. Joy isn’t what you feel when your deepest ambitions have been thwarted. It is what you feel when your nation has survived, your hostages are home and your children can dream again. It turns out Israel’s goal was never destruction—it was peace."
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Read the full article here.
Israel continues to strike Hezbollah, Lebanon's Aoun calls for negotiations
Israel continued to
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strike Hezbollah terror targets in Lebanon over the past week, working to prevent the terror group from rebuilding and rearming with help from Iran.
Meanwhile, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun
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called for U.S.-mediated negotiations with Israel, saying, “Conditions are moving toward negotiations to achieve peace and stability… We cannot be outside the ongoing track in the region.”
In his speech at the Israeli Knesset this week, President Trump said the United States is supporting Lebanon’s efforts “to permanently disarm Hezbollah’s terror brigades,” adding that thanks to Israel’s military success, “the dagger of Hezbollah, long aimed at Israel’s throat, has been totally shattered.”
In August 2024, the Lebanese government promised to disarm the Iran-backed terrorist group, but thus far has failed to do so, forcing Israel to carry out strikes.
The United States and our allies must increase the pressure on the Lebanese government to follow through on their promise to fully disarming Hezbollah.
Houthis manipulate aid and U.N. data to maintain control
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New reporting in Reuters explains how the Iran-backed Houthi terrorist group rules its territory in Yemen with an iron fist: holding detractors in underground prisons, making people attend rallies and chant ‘death to America and Israel’ and forcing families to pay crippling taxes and hand over their children to become soldiers.
Using the threat of starvation as a weapon, the Houthis "give you a choice: be with them and take a food basket to stave off hunger, or get nothing," a man who fled a Houthi-controlled part of Yemen
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said .
"The Houthis have effectively hijacked much of the humanitarian aid supply chain," the report said, ensuring "those who receive aid are often Houthi loyalists such as militia fighters."
Meanwhile, the Houthis "handpicked" United Nations data collectors used to help the global hunger monitor IPC make famine assessments. "The Houthis also determined which households would be surveyed," which "enabled the Houthis to magnify the hunger problem.
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Read the full article here.
Since Hamas' October 7 attack, the Houthis, whose slogan includes "Death to America" and "Death to Israel," have launched hundreds of missile and drone attacks against Israel, U.S. Navy ships, and commercial vessels.
Continue to
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follow AIPAC on social media for the latest updates.
Jake Braunstein
Director of Policy Communications
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The mission of AIPAC is to encourage and persuade the U.S. government to enact specific policies that create a strong, enduring and mutually beneficial relationship with our ally Israel.
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