In a significant development, the Israeli army has stated that its soldiers “mistakenly” killed three hostages after mistaking them for a threat.
“During combat in Shejaiya, the IDF (army) mistook three Israeli hostages for a threat.” As a result, the troops opened fire on them, killing them,” the army said in a statement, expressing “deep remorse over the tragic incident.”
“The IDF began reviewing the incident immediately… Immediate lessons from the event have been learned, which have been passed on to all IDF troops in the field,” it added, expressing “deep remorse over the tragic incident.”.
After a request from the family, the army identified two of the hostages but withheld the identity of the third.
Yotam Haim, one of the dead hostages, was kidnapped by Hamas during an attack on Kibbutz Kfar Aza on October 7. Samer El-Talaqa, the second hostage, was taken from Kibbutz Nir Am.
When Hamas launched its attack on October 7, it killed 1200 Israelis and took approximately 250 hostages.