GAZA STRIP (AFP) – Israel’s military announced Sunday the discovery of six dead Gaza hostages, as medics in Palestinian territory braced for pauses in fighting for a polio vaccination drive.
The hostages’ remains were recovered on Saturday “from an underground tunnel in the Rafah area” and formally identified in Israel, a military statement said.
US President Joe Biden said he was “devastated and outraged” by the deaths.
They were among 251 hostages seized during the October 7 attack on southern Israel by Palestinian militants. Around 100 hostages remain in captivity, dozens of whom the Israeli military says are dead.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it “bows its head in mourning” for the latest deaths and called for a ceasefire deal.
“Were it not for the delays, sabotage, and excuses those whose deaths we learned about this morning would likely still be alive,” the campaign group said.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign since October 7 has reduced Gaza to ruins, devastating water and sanitation facilities, while disease has spread.
Following the first confirmed polio case in the besieged Palestinian territory in 25 years, a Gaza health official said vaccinations began Saturday ahead of a wider campaign.
The World Health Organization says Israel has agreed to a series of three-day “humanitarian pauses” to facilitate the polio vaccination drive, which an international aid worker told AFP would start in earnest Sunday.
