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Source: https://forward.com/opinion/848177/gaza-hamas-palestinians-hostages/
Hamas Still Holds Gaza Captive
(Forward) Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib - Almost 10 months after the October 2025 President Trump-brokered ceasefire and hostage-release agreement, Hamas, the fascistic terror group whose catastrophic Oct. 7, 2023, attack unleashed unprecedented suffering on Palestinians in Gaza, is vastly weakened but still rules a third of the Strip, where two million people remain trapped under its totalitarian grip. In Western societies like the U.S., many who call themselves "pro-Palestine" have refused, out of negligence, ignorance, or deliberately, to confront Hamas's narrative, behavior, and agenda, while normalizing or excusing the group's criminality, history, and behavior. Hamas embedded itself across Gazan society by weaponizing religion and social services, especially in the refugee camps that had become mini-cities. I watched the group's rise in Gaza City firsthand, including encounters my own family had with senior Hamas figures, without falling into its grip. Much of today's pro-Palestinian discourse is starved of honest critique of Hamas, and of the Palestinian leaders, groups, and elites who have failed and even betrayed their own people. Failed, ineffective, and morally reprehensible types of armed "resistance," like taking women and children as hostages on Oct. 7, are glorified. Hamas is excused, supported, and whitewashed. When Hamas tortures, beats, kills, and abuses Gazans, they are ignored at best, or labeled collaborators, traitors, and worthy of execution at worst.