Gaza aid trucks mobbed; new Israeli hostage video released

Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder on Tuesday said that U.S. soldiers had easily moved aid from Cyprus to a newly built pier and then onto land in Gaza. But once the trucks left their marshaling stations, Palestinian people mobbed the trucks to get the food and aid, preventing it from reaching other areas needing aid, Ryder said.

The situation is complex, and the United States, Israel, and United Nations aid workers are trying to establish new, safer routes out of the marshaling stations so it can get to Palestinians who need it, Ryder said. Meanwhile, the Israeli office for the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories, or COGAT, reported on Wednesday that hundreds of aid trucks have been making their way across the Kerem Shalom and Erez crossings into Gaza.

What else is going on in Gaza? The families of several female hostages, who were working as Israel Defense Forces observers, posted a video on Wednesday of their loved ones’ capture during Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. That attack killed roughly 1,200 people. The families called for the Israeli government to bring their loved ones home. Two of the seven women depicted in the video are no longer hostages—IDF soldiers rescued one, and another died in Gaza, according to a report by CNN. The other five women presumably remain in Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday said that he was shocked by the video and the government would do everything it could to bring the hostages home. The brutality of Hamas only further motivated him to wipe out the organization entirely to make sure instances like the one captured in the video could not happen again, he said.

Dig deeper: Read Leo Briceno’s report in The Stew about how the U.S. House of Representatives is demanding that the Biden administration no longer withhold aid from Israel.