Hostage Yagev Buchshtav was ‘executed’ by Hamas in Feb. as IDF closed in, mother says
‘Military pressure does not bring hostages back alive. It kills them,’ mother tells Knesset, citing autopsy report; Buchshtav’s death echoes murders of six hostages in late August
The mother of slain hostage Yagev Buchshtav told the Knesset on Monday that her son had been executed by the Hamas terror group as Israeli forces closed in on his location several months ago, according to an autopsy report she received on Sunday.
“The army was close to the tunnel and they were executed. That’s what comes from military pressure. Military pressure does not bring hostages back alive, it kills them,” Buchstav’s mother Esther said.
“My son was kidnapped alive… He should have returned alive. He returned dead. Murdered,” she told lawmakers at the Knesset.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, under pressure for almost a year to strike a hostage-ceasefire deal with Hamas to secure the remaining captives’ release, has repeatedly said that only “military pressure” will force the terror group to the negotiating table.
Yagev Buchshtav, 34, was abducted from Kibbutz Nirim on October 7, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, amid acts of brutality and sexual assault, triggering the ongoing war.
His death in captivity was announced in July, and in August Israel Defense Forces troops recovered his body, along with those of five others, from a tunnel in southern Gaza. He was killed sometime in February, his mother said.
“I don’t think the army is guilty here,” she clarified. “It is the policy of the government. The army does what they tell them.”
The testimony from Buchshtav’s mother came a week after the IDF recovered the bodies of six other Israeli hostages, who had survived some 11 months in captivity before being executed by their captors just days before the military reached them.
The hostages’ murder sparked outrage in Israel, drawing hundreds of thousands of people to the streets and provoking a one-day general strike. On Saturday night, organizers of a Tel Aviv rally claimed it was the largest protest in Israeli history, drawing a purported 500,000 demonstrators.
Critics allege that Netanyahu has obstructed a hostage-ceasefire deal by insisting that Israel maintain a security presence along the Gaza-Egypt border.
US President Joe Biden has been among those criticizing the prime minister for not making more concessions, and the White House has said it will present a new proposal for a deal in the coming days.
A report by Channel 12 on Sunday, however, cited unnamed sources in the Israeli security establishment who said the odds of an agreement soon are “close to zero,” and that the US may not even suggest new terms.
An Israeli official told The Times of Israel on Monday that the government still expects an American proposal, but that the US was being cautious due to Hamas intransigence.
It is believed that 97 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 33 confirmed dead by the IDF.
The terror group released 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November, and four hostages were released before that. Eight hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 37 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the military as they tried to escape their captors.
Hamas is also holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.
