Netanyahu critics note he met with freed hostages, not other victims

Families in Israel whose loved ones have been either killed by Palestinian Islamist Hamas militia or who remain in captivity in Gaza criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for meeting with freed hostages but not with families of other victims.

A leading opposition politician joined in the criticism.

“When you are prime minister, you are the prime minister of successes and defeats,” opposition leader Yair Lapid told Israel’s Kan channel on Sunday. “To be prime minister only when everything works out and to disappear when everything doesn’t go the way you want, that’s pathetic.”

Netanyahu met with four hostages freed from the Gaza Strip in hospital on Saturday – during the Sabbath or Jewish day of rest, – and had his picture taken.

According to media reports, however, families of Israelis killed during the Hamas massacre on October 7 and relatives of hostages who were killed were angered that neither Netanyahu nor other government representatives had made contact with them.

“A prime minister with moral values would have called to comfort and strengthen (us). And to apologize for what happened on his watch,” the father of a soldier killed on October 7 wrote on X.

Asked about his opinion of Netanyahu, the father said: “I despise him, a shabby person.”