W.Minh Tuan
In early December 2024, Hamas forces released a video of an American-Israeli who was being held hostage by Hamas.
In this video, this hostage called on Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, and US President-elect Trump, who had not yet taken office, to further intensify negotiations to release all Israeli hostages held by Hamas.
Of course, we understand that “intensifying negotiations” is Hamas’ way of forcing this hostage to speak in the video, not to intensify the war.
Looking at the image of this hostage in the video, he seems healthy, proving that he has been eating quite well, but his skin is a bit pale, proving that he has rarely been out in the sun during his detention up to now.
After this video was released, the newly elected US President Trump immediately announced a threat to Hamas, that Hamas must release all 101 remaining Israeli hostages before January 20, 2025, the day that Mr. Trump will officially assume the position of US President, replacing Mr. Biden, that if Hamas does not release all Israeli hostages before January 20, 2025, Hamas and those involved will receive unprecedented punishment in history.
Currently, the views of Hamas and Israel on releasing the hostages are very different, Hamas demands a ceasefire, ending the war first, then releasing the hostages later.
The opinion of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is the opposite, releasing all hostages first, ending the war later.
And now, US President Trump also has the same opinion as Mr. Netanyahu, and even stronger, which is to release the hostages immediately before January 20, 2025.
After hearing Mr. Trump speak so strongly, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu remained silent and did not respond or comment.
Perhaps because Mr. Netanyahu has deeply felt the pain of the consequences of this act of using force to threaten Hamas, because in August 2024, Mr. Netanyahu also used force to threaten Hamas, by firing precise missiles to kill the number 1 leader of Hamas, when this leader visited Iran, and Hamas retaliated by shooting dead 6 Israeli hostages, dumping their bodies in a tunnel.
If Mr. Netanyahu had not killed this Hamas leader, the 6 Israeli hostages would not have been killed.
After the 6 hostages were killed, hundreds of thousands of Israelis took to the streets to protest against Mr. Netanyahu, calling for negotiations to free all the hostages first, as a top priority, and destroying Hamas is a long-term task, to be done later.
And now, Mr. Trump threatens to “pay to the hell” to Hamas, then it is very likely that the remaining 101 hostages will also be killed by Hamas, and then it is truly “pay to the hell”, but not Hamas, but it is Mr. Netanyahu, and Mr. Trump.
Why don’t Mr. Trump and Mr. Netanyahu have a smart, resolute solution like this:
“The Gaza war will stop immediately after the last hostage is released” – this slogan will help the whole world understand Israel’s goodwill, that the Gaza war happened because Hamas is still holding Israeli hostages, and help build Israel’s righteous image in the international arena, and make the world understand more clearly the brutality and injustice of Hamas.
But Netanyahu did not do that, he continued to attack Gaza, and continued to demand Hamas to release the hostages, he did not prioritize the release of the hostages, but he prioritized both goals, which were to release the hostages, and to destroy Hamas at the same time.
Those two goals cannot be placed in parallel, it is like a person about to drown in a river, you have to pull that person out of the water first, not to bail out all the water in the river to eliminate the risk of drowning.
But Netanyahu did the opposite, he wanted to bail out all the water in the river to eliminate the risk of drowning, but left the person who was about to drown there.
And now, with Trump, it is similar, Trump threatened the person who caused the river, “You have to pull the drowning person out, otherwise I will kill you“, but Trump did not directly talk to the person who caused the river to bail out the person who was about to drown first.
Using force to threaten terrorists to release all hostages is wrong, because terrorists are extremists, “deaf to guns”, people with abnormal nervous systems, people who do not fully understand the bad, desperate, meaningless consequences of terrorist acts, so threatening them only makes them more extremists, more stupid, more insane.
To destroy terrorists and release all hostages, one must have a cool, intelligent, and sober head, not a boiling head like Mr. Trump and Mr. Netanyahu.
A boiling head like Mr. Trump and Mr. Netanyahu will only make the fate of the remaining 101 Israeli hostages more precarious, dangerous, and unpredictable.///