Families fear for hostages in Gaza as mood shifts

Eli Albag had been fighting for the release of his daughter from captivity in Gaza for almost a year when he was pelted by eggs and verbally abused.

- Peter Beaumont and Quique Kierszenbaum

The father of 19-year-old Liri Albag, who is being held by Hamas, was protesting outside an event attended by Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in the coastal city of Netanya.

There he was attacked and shouted at by rightwing activists. "You've made enough noise, be quiet," one told him. "You are cancer in the country," another called as he was accused of being "funded by Hamas".

Now a full year into Israel's hostage crisis and war against Gaza, in response to Hamas's 7 October attack on border communities which saw 251 Israeli and other citizens abducted, advocacy over the remaining captives has become increasingly politicised as their situation has become ever more fraught.

While outright incidents such as that targeting Albag are rare amid broad support for the hostage families, relatives have watched as the focus has shifted from the Israeli operation against Gaza to the conflict with Hezbollah in the north, with no movement on those still held by Hamas.

And over a long year, the hopes raised by the release of 117 hostages early in the war, including 105 in a mass exchange during a brief ceasefire in November 2023, have dissipated as the offensive has dragged on and more dead than living hostages have been found during Israeli operations.

The grim news of hostages found dead has punctuated the glacial pace of negotiations for a ceasefirefor-hostages deal that Netanyahu, critics say, has been in no hurry to advance. A year on, some families have compared their situation to being trapped in a swamp and unable to move forward from the consequences of 7 October.

At her home in a kibbutz near Netanya, Bat-Sheva Yahalomi has experienced both relief and the agony of waiting, seeing her child released - but knowing her husband remains missing.