Families Urge Prisoner Deal for Hamas Hostages

Freeing 239 Israeli hostages in exchange for over 6,000 Hamas prisoners in Israeli jails. That is Hamas’ “Everyone for Everyone” demand, which has placed the Israeli government in a complicated spot. Families of the abducted are urging the government to accept.

Avi Marciano is Noa Marciano’s father. Noa was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. “Noa is a very special girl, she loves to sing, laugh, and play. She really loves books, she reads a lot, and she loves Disney movies. She is a girl who was kidnapped and taken to Gaza,” he told The Media Line.

Noa Marciano. (Courtesy Marciano family)

The last time he spoke to her, she was in a bomb shelter. “Noa [was] really [scared], and she called us while crying,” he added. Later that morning, she called again. “She was whispering, and she said that she needed to hang up. Since then, we haven’t spoken to her,” Marciano continued.

Marciano, just like many other family members of the hostages, goes almost daily to the tents that the loved ones of the abducted have set up in central Tel Aviv. Many people arrive there every day to show support for them. Some, are demanding that the government do a deal with Hamas and release all the Hamas prisoners from Israeli jails in exchange for the over 239 kidnapped that are currently being held in Gaza.

“I hope that the deal will take place soon and that there will not be selection among the hostages. I hope everyone is released as fast as possible,” he stressed.

Alon Shirizly, an Israeli citizen who arrived at the tents in support of the families, told The Media Line that even if making such a deal with Hamas can be seen as an “evil deal,” the government must do it, as he sees it as the only option to bring the hostages back to Israel.

We must have a deal with the terrorist. Even if they are terrorists. Because otherwise, we will not see again our loved ones, they will be buried in the Hamas tunnels in the Gaza Strip and we will not see them anymore.

“We must have a deal with the terrorists,” he said. “Even if they are terrorists. Because otherwise, we will not see again our loved ones, they will be buried in the Hamas tunnels in the Gaza Strip and we will not see them anymore,” Shirizly continued.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with the families of the kidnapped when they demanded that the government do what it takes to bring their loved ones back home. Even if it means making the deal.

Everyone has their own ideas, said Shirizly, when asked about the people who opposed such a deal. “But what I have to say, I say to the government. To our prime minister: Be brave, make a deal with the terrorists,” he said.

Ilania Arbel, who also came to show her support for the cause, was born in Iraq in the 1940s and moved to Israel in 1951 after her family faced discrimination in that country for being Jewish.

Arbel wrote a poem in Arabic, intended for Hamas, which she recited: “And in the end, O Hamas, we want to live in love and peace. Life is beautiful. We are mothers. We have babies, children, men, women, elderly. You have them, too. What are they guilty of? It cannot be possible that for years we have been killing each other. The Quran says that God is greater than Satan. Where is the humanity? Where is the conscience? You are worse than animals. Hamas is ISIS.”