A quarter of the hostages kidnapped from Israel by Hamas terrorists were farm workers from Thailand.
Reuters reports:
More than half the estimated 220 hostages held by Palestinian group Hamas have foreign passports from 25 different countries, including 54 Thai nationals, the Israeli government said on Wednesday.
In providing updated figures, the government also said 328 people from 40 countries were confirmed as dead or missing after the surprise Oct. 7 attack by Hamas fighters on southern Israel. In all, an estimated 1,400 people were killed in the assault.
Israel said 138 of the hostages had foreign passports, including 15 Argentinians, 12 Germans, 12 Americans, six French and six Russians.
Many were believed to have had dual Israeli nationality, however some, like the Thais and five Nepalese hostages, almost certainly did not. There was also one Chinese hostage, one Sri Lankan, two from Tanzania and two from the Philippines.
Thais also made up the largest single group of foreign dead and missing, with 24 confirmed killed and 21 unaccounted for.
Thailand is one of the largest sources of migrant workers in Israel, with around 30,000 working in the agriculture sector, according to government data.
Among other foreign nations that suffered heavy losses were the United States, with 34 killed and five missing, Ukraine, with 25 killed and two missing, France, with 23 killed and one missing, and Russia with 23 killed and four missing.
Five Chinese citizens were killed and one was missing, while Nepal had five killed and five missing.
Hamas kidnapped many civilians, including small children, seizing them as hostages. This hostage-taking came after the Biden administration agreed to pay a $6 billion ransom to Iran in exchange for the release of five American hostages. Hamas admits Iran gave it weapons it used in its attack on Israel. The Biden administration released millions of dollars to the Hamas-controlled government of the Gaza strip.
Some Hamas sympathizers in America have justified its killings and kidnappings as a matter of anti-colonialism. A diversity and inclusion director at Cornell University supported the Hamas terror attack, writing that Hamas was “fighting for life, dignity, and freedom…against settler colonization, imperialism, capitalism, white supremacy, which the United States is the model.”
But the Thai farm workers massacred and kidnapped by Hamas are not colonists (even under the perverse doctrine that labels Israelis born in Israel as “settler-colonists”). They are just in Israel to work and earn money to support their families back in Thailand, 4000 miles away from Israel.
Yet, a “Cornell University professor was caught on camera telling students Hamas’ terror attack on Israel — which has left more than 1,400 dead — was ‘exhilarating’ and ‘energizing,’” reported the New York Post.
