It tends to be true that the witness of history is almost universal in this, that if you attack your neighbour in an unprovoked surprise attack, and then you subsequently lose the war that happens as a direct response to that, you usually lose both your government and your sovereignty, and very often actually transfers take place that you don't want or support, but which frankly you just have to put up with.

It's 10 o'clock a.m. on Saturday, February 22nd here in New York City. It is 5 o'clock p.m. on Saturday, February 22nd in Israel, as six hostages have been welcomed back home. There's been a lot of dramatic and

excruciating developments over the past 48 hours. So we are doing something we typically do not do,

which is releasing this episode on Shabbat. We typically try to have a day of rest,

even hear it call me back on Shabbat. But there try to have a day of rest, even hear it call me back on Shabbat.

But there has just been so much happening. We've been getting a ton of questions. We are going to

release today. And also because there's all this very intense news, this introduction, my

introduction today will be longer than usual, so please bear with us.

After a brutal 24 hours for the Bebas family and for all of us, six hostages were released from

Gaza today. They are Elia Cohen, Omer Shemtov, Omer Wenkert, Tal Shoham, and Averam Mengistu.

A sixth hostage, Hisham al-Sayed, an Israeli Arab, was spared the humiliating ceremony

and was transferred to Israel by the Red Cross later in the day.

As all of you know, late Thursday, Israel determined that the body of a

woman Hamas had released from Gaza was not, in fact, the body of Shiri Bebas, or the body of any

Israeli hostage. On Friday, in an announcement that summoned a new wave of shock and heartbreak,

the IDF found that Kfir and Ariel Bibas were not killed in an Israeli air strike,

as Hamas had originally claimed.

According to forensic examinations by multiple authorities,

the young boys were murdered at the hands of their captors in November of 2023.

Kfir was just 10 months old, and Ariel was four years old at the time of their murder.

And then on Friday, so just yesterday, Hamas handed over the body of what they claimed to be Shiri Bebas.

They handed the body over to the International Red Cross.

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