Israeli officials say it's not the time for hostage negotiations amid war against Hamas
Israeli officials gave a press briefing on their war against Hamas Wednesday morning, but it was abruptly ended by a government spokesperson due to attacks in the area.
The information session went on for nearly an hour before that took place, and a member of the Israel Defense Forces said their goal at the moment is to make sure Hamas can never do this to Israel again.
That, according to Lt. Colonel Peter Lerner, is why they're not currently interested in investigating how the current attack was able to take place.
"We aren't ready to talk about that because we are focused on how to prevent it from happening again," Lerner said. "There will be time for a review of the circumstances, but these are things that will have to be investigated at a later time."
Lerner said there have been over 5,000 rockets fired at Israel since Saturday, so one of their priorities is to destroy the infrastructure that made that possible.
He said they're also working to eliminate Hamas' ability to gather intelligence and are going after the leaders he said coordinated and carried out the attack on Saturday.
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A member of the media then asked how many hostages are currently being held, and Lior Haiat of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said they believe that number is somewhere between 100 and 150.
He added that it's not the time to negotiate for their release.
"I don't think this is time for negotiations," Haiat said. "We are still fighting with terrorists that are entering Israeli territory."
Haiat said the hostages include babies, young kids, women, and elderly from places including Israel, America, Argentina, Germany, and Australia.
Noam Peri was part of Wednesday's press conference because her 80-year-old father was captured Saturday morning.
"(My parents) woke up in a different type of situation - dozens of terrorists invaded and started butchering residents," Peri said. "They butchered my friends and the people I grew up with. There is no family in the kibbutz that was left unhurt."
She said 80 people in her parent's community are missing, and more than 20 were murdered.
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