Ceasefire between Israel and Hamas: who are Ofer Kalderon and Ohad Yahalomi, the two Franco-Israeli hostages soon to be released?

This is an agreement eagerly awaited by the families of Israeli hostages still held in the Gaza Strip. While the terms of release were validated on Saturday January 18 by the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Emmanuel Macron announced Friday on “list of 33 hostages to be released in the first phase of the Gaza agreement.” “We remain tirelessly mobilized so that their families can find them,” he said.

Abducted during the Nir Oz Kibbutz massacre

The two Franco-Israelis were both kidnapped during the October 7 attacks in Kibbutz Nir Oz, a collectivist and agricultural community located in the northwest of the Negev desert, on the border with the Gaza Strip. According to the Jerusalem PostHamas terrorists, who entered the kibbutz that day, murdered 240 of the 400 inhabitants of this community founded in 1992. Ofer Kalderon, now 54 years old, is one of the miraculous victims. He was then kidnapped with his two children, Erez and Sahar, aged 12 and 16 respectively at the time. The teenagers will be released during the first truce, on November 27, 2023.

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The fate of Ohad Yahalomi is almost identical. The 50-year-old Franco-Israeli was kidnapped just like his son, Eitan, 12 years old at the time of the massacre, and who was also able to reunite with his family during the truce in November 2023.

An unknown location

But where are the two French hostages? For the NGO Amnesty International, which is calling for their release, they are certainly being held “in residential buildings located in highly populated civilian areas.” The objective is to limit as much as possible a possible intervention by the Israeli military, which has the consequence of endangering the lives of civilians in Gaza and violating their obligation to take all possible precautions to protect the civilian population. under their control against the effects of the attacks,” the statement added.

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“Hostage-taking is a war crime,” also recalls Erika Guevara-Rosas, general director of research, advocacy, policies and campaigns at Amnesty International. “Nothing can justify the trauma and anguish that these people and their loved ones are experiencing.”

Difficult living conditions

If the agreement is indeed respected, the two French hostages should be among the hostages released from this Sunday. However, such captivity is not without physical and psychological consequences. The UN is warning in particular of the numerous cases of torture and human rights violations. Aviva Siegel, kidnapped with her husband in the kibbutz of Kfar Aza, for 51 days before being released, reported to our colleagues at BFMTV that she had “been tortured numerous times, in every way you can imagine.”

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Only their return will shed light on what the last two French hostages experienced in captivity. According to Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdelrahmane Al-Thani, architect of this ceasefire agreement, there are still 60 presumed hostages alive in the Gaza Strip. In return, the agreement provides for the release of several hundred Palestinian prisoners. The Israeli response caused more than 48,000 deaths, the majority of them women and children, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.