Hostage releases are good news - but Hamas still needs to be eliminated: Bill Carmichael

For example when 12-year-old Eitan Yahalomi stepped from an Israeli helicopter after more than seven weeks in a Hamas hellhole, his mother was shown silently hugging him for such a long time it seemed she would never let him go.

Similarly, Irish-born Tom Hand embraced nine-year-old Emily with the biggest smile you can imagine - a reunion made all the more touching because Tom was initially told his daughter had been murdered during the pogrom.

Among others released this week was Sharon Aloni Cunio, and her three-year-old twin daughters Emma and Yuly.

Who on earth kidnaps three-year-old children? Proof, if any were needed, that Hamas is bereft of any moral sensibilities whatsoever. They either killed children or kidnapped them.

All this was good news, as was the temporary halt to the hostilities in Gaza to allow aid trucks to enter the territory.

But the impact of what they experienced may leave lasting scars on these poor children.

For example, Avigail Idan, who turned four during her captivity in Gaza and was released earlier this week, witnessed both her parents being shot dead by Hamas gunmen before she was taken hostage.

And according to his aunt, Eitan was beaten by civilians when he was first taken to Gaza, and then forced to watch videos of the atrocities. When the children started to cry, they were threatened with guns.

His aunt, Deborah Cohen, told French television: “I wanted to hope he was treated well. Turns out he wasn’t. They are monsters.” It is very difficult to disagree with that statement.

According to her father Emily Hand cannot speak above a whisper, and thinks she was held captive for about a year. “You can see the terror in her eyes”, said Mr Hand.

Eitan’s father, and the twins’ father, are believed to be still held hostage in Gaza.

One thing to note here is that when Hamas and other terror groups take Israelis hostage, as they have done many times, they often keep them captive for many years.

For example, when IDF soldier Gilad Shalit was seized by Hamas in a cross border raid in 2006 they held him captive for more than five years.

Yet this time the hostages are being released in a matter of weeks. Why? Simply because Hamas is being smashed to bits, and are desperately trying to catch a break.

The IDF has been criticised for their actions in Gaza, and the deaths of civilians are always to be regretted, but the Israeli tactics are working.

It is hard to escape the conclusion that if Israel had not punished Hamas so effectively, these children would have been held hostage in underground bunkers for many years.

If we want more hostages released the international community must allow Israel to keep up the pressure on the terror group.

A further piece of good news came on Sunday with a march in London against antisemitism that attracted more than 100,000 people.

In sharp contrast to the pro-Palestinain hate marches we have become familiar with, there were no aggressive people in masks, no racist placards or eliminationist chanting, no calls for violent jihad, and no desecration of war memorials.

Instead there was a dignified call for peace and a demand that all the hostages are released. For many I suspect it was the first protest they had ever attended, and there were some who looked bewildered. But that just made their chants of “Bring Them Home!” all the more poignant.

Remarkably, given the numbers of people at the protest, there were only two arrests, and neither of them were participants in the march.

This show of support for a peaceful solution in the Middle East from people of all faiths and none was especially important.

I know from my postbag that many in the UK’s Jewish community feel threatened by the hate marchers and abandoned by people they looked on as friends.

What Sunday’s determined demonstration showed is that despite all the noisy posturing from the extremist racist fringe on social media and on the streets, there is a vast silent majority of decent Britons who want to offer love and support to our Jewish neighbours.

In the coming days if Hamas keep coughing up hostages they will put off - temporarily - their complete destruction.

But make no mistake it is only after Hamas is eliminated that Israelis and Palestinians can build a peaceful solution.