When the mother of one of the Thai hostages held in the Gaza Strip for more than a year caught sight of her son on a Facebook livestream after his release on Thursday, he had changed so much that she did not recognize him at first.
Surasak Rumnao, 32, who was kidnapped from the southern Israeli town of Yesha on Oct. 7, 2023, looked pale and puffy, his mother, Khammee Lamnao, said.
“I was so happy that I could not eat anything. His father brought some food to me, but I did not want to eat at all,” Khammee said on a video call after the release of her son.
Photo: Royal Thai Embassy in Tel Aviv via AP
Dozens of Israeli doctors, nurses and representatives from Israel and Thailand waved flags, sang and cheered on Thursday as the five Thai hostages stepped off a military helicopter and entered a hospital outside Tel Aviv, where they were to spend a few days undergoing medical tests and recuperating.
Three Israelis were also released, and Israel released 110 Palestinian prisoners in the exchange.
Besides Sarusak, Watchara Sriaoun, 33, Sathian Suwannakham, 35, Pongsak Thaenna, 36, and Bannawat Saethao, 27, were released in Thursday’s exchange.
Hamas militants kidnapped 31 Thai nationals during the assault on southern Israel, making them the largest group of foreigners held captive. Many of the Thai agricultural workers lived in compounds on the outskirts of southern Israeli kibbutzim and towns, and Hamas militants overran those places first.
During an earlier ceasefire in November 2023, 23 Thai nationals were released in a deal negotiated between Thailand and Hamas, with assistance from Qatar and Iran.
Forty-six Thais have been killed during the conflict, including two Thai citizens who were killed on Oct. 7, 2023, and their bodies taken into Gaza, the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
Osnat Levzion-Korach, the director of Shamir Medical Center outside Tel Aviv where the five were taken, said they were in “fair” health, although most were held underground and were not exposed to sunlight for extended periods of time.
She said they did not appear to be malnourished and credited their young age with helping them survive captivity in fairly good physical shape.
Thai Ambassador to Israel Pannabha Chandraramya said she facilitated video calls between the hostages and their families after they arrived at the hospital, describing them as incredibly emotional, with shouts of joy and tears.
It was “one of the happiest days of her life” to see their release just a week before she ends her five-year term, she said.
There was no immediate information available about the last Thai hostage left in Gaza, Nattapong Pingsa, nor the two Thai workers whose bodies were taken into Gaza, Pannabha said.
Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra thanked Qatar, Egypt, Iran, Turkey, the US, Israel and the Red Cross, for helping to negotiate the Thais’ release in a separate deal from the Israel-Hamas ceasefire.
She said Thailand’s minister of foreign affairs would travel to Israel this weekend.
Pannabha said that the Thai government might bring some relatives of the released hostages to Israel, although many do not have passports, and the government would help those released return home as soon as they are medically cleared to travel.
‘TERRORIST ATTACK’: The convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri resulted in the ‘martyrdom of five of our armed forces,’ the Presidential Leadership Council said A blast targeting the convoy of a Saudi Arabian-backed armed group killed five in Yemen’s southern city of Aden and injured the commander of the government-allied unit, officials said on Wednesday. “The treacherous terrorist attack targeting the convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri, commander of the Second Giants Brigade, resulted in the martyrdom of five of our armed forces heroes and the injury of three others,” Yemen’s Saudi Arabia-backed Presidential Leadership Council said in a statement published by Yemeni news agency Saba. A security source told reporters that a car bomb on the side of the road in the Ja’awla area in
PRECARIOUS RELATIONS: Commentators in Saudi Arabia accuse the UAE of growing too bold, backing forces at odds with Saudi interests in various conflicts A Saudi Arabian media campaign targeting the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has deepened the Gulf’s worst row in years, stoking fears of a damaging fall-out in the financial heart of the Middle East. Fiery accusations of rights abuses and betrayal have circulated for weeks in state-run and social media after a brief conflict in Yemen, where Saudi airstrikes quelled an offensive by UAE-backed separatists. The United Arab Emirates is “investing in chaos and supporting secessionists” from Libya to Yemen and the Horn of Africa, Saudi Arabia’s al-Ekhbariya TV charged in a report this week. Such invective has been unheard of
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
US President Donald Trump on Saturday warned Canada that if it concludes a trade deal with China, he would impose a 100 percent tariff on all goods coming over the border. Relations between the US and its northern neighbor have been rocky since Trump returned to the White House a year ago, with spats over trade and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney decrying a “rupture” in the US-led global order. During a visit to Beijing earlier this month, Carney hailed a “new strategic partnership” with China that resulted in a “preliminary, but landmark trade agreement” to reduce tariffs — but
RSS