The Kremlin announced contacts with Palestine regarding Hamas hostages

Russia is in contact with Palestine based on information that allegedly Russians are also among the hostages of Hamas. This was stated by the press secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov.

“The necessary contacts are being made in order to find out whether this is true or not, and what the future fate of these people is,” he said.

October 9 Reuters, citing a Hamas representative wrotethat the militants captured Israelis with dual citizenship, including Russian. The number of hostages was not specified. Later Hamas reported on establishing contacts with Moscow for negotiations on prisoners. We are talking about “dozens of people with dual citizenship,” said Musa Abu Marzouk, a member of the Hamas Politburo.

Hamas representatives make conflicting statements regarding the future fate of the hostages. The head of the group’s external relations department, Basem Naim, said that they would be safe. At the same time, the official representative of the military wing of the movement, Abu Ubaida threatened kill prisoners if Israel does not stop attacks on the Gaza Strip.

Earlier today, the number of Russians killed in the Hamas attack on Israel increased to two. The embassy refused to disclose their names and other details, since diplomats have not yet contacted the relatives of the victims and “do not know all the circumstances.” Four more Russians are listed as missing, the diplomatic mission previously reported.

On the morning of October 7, Hamas began military operations against Israel. The militants attacked army border units and entered Israeli populated areas, where they captured an unknown number of hostages, both military and civilian.

The Israeli Army (IDF) responded by launching Operation Iron Swords, and the Israeli government announced that the country had entered a state of war. On October 9, the IDF announced the restoration of control over all populated areas of Israel and the transition to the phase of the complete destruction of Hamas.

The total number of deaths in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, according to the latest data, exceeded already 1500 people.