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Qatar has informed today that at least 40 women and children held hostage in Gaza are not in the hands of Hamas, and no one has information on where they might be.
Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al Thani said they "can never contact the hostages", despite their lines of communication with Hamas. According to Qatar, finding the missing would be the key to extending the current ceasefire.
Hamas leaders have previously blamed other militant groups for the disappearance of the hostages, saying they took advantage of the damage done to the Israeli border since October 7 to smuggle their captives into Gaza.
Israel has said it is "assessing" the list of hostages still expected to be released under the current ceasefire.
So far, 117 of the 150 Palestinian prisoners promised by the Israelis have been released, in exchange for 40 of the 50 hostages accepted by Hamas.
Who can keep them?
Although Qatar says more than 40 hostages are missing, one of Hamas's rival militant groups, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, has claimed it is holding 30 of them.
Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director at the transatlantic think tank the Counter Extremism Project, says the situation is "terribly unclear".
"It is important to note that Islamic Jihad and Hamas do not have a cooperative relationship, they are rivals. So it is not entirely clear whether Hamas can get Islamic Jihad to release any of the hostages it may be holding. And it appears that they and Hamas were not the only ones involved in the October 7 attack. There has been a well-developed smuggling economy in Gaza for decades, long before Hamas took control, organized by networks of crime families. So it is possible that the hostages are neither under the control of Hamas nor Islamic Jihad, but these criminal organizations," he told Sky News.
Can Hamas lie?
Qatar's ties to Hamas are good based on the fact that its leaders operate in Doha. This implies that Sheikh Mohammed's claims about the missing hostages likely came from the group.
Schindler says Hamas would not lie to Qatar as a way to indirectly deceive Israel.
"But if they are, this is a strategy they should consider 'very, very carefully', as it means a breakdown in relations. It is in Hamas's interest to continue these negotiations, for two reasons. First, they want for the Palestinians to be released from Israeli prisons, but secondly, they want to stop Israel's second offensive. So, on the one hand, they want to play games, but they also don't want to break the deal. The continuation of the hostage-prisoner exchange is also important to the legitimacy of Hamas with the people of Gaza. This is a two-part negotiation. One with Israel and then one inside the country, to show the Palestinian community that it was worth it and why Gaza was destroyed and the Palestinians were used as human shields. They want to use this exchange situation to their maximum advantage, because before October 7, 70% of Gazans said they did not like Hamas and did not think it would improve," Schindler said.
As of late October, Hamas has claimed that between 50 and 60 hostages have been killed in airstrikes.
Abu Ubaida, spokesman for the Qassam Brigades, the group's military wing, said the bodies of the 23 missing Israeli hostages had been found in the rubble.
Professor Clarke claims, however, that with the hostages likely to be held in tunnels under Gaza, they are safer than most in the territory and are unlikely to have been killed.
He also notes that Hamas has not identified any hostages who are presumed dead.
It would be to their advantage to name them because it would increase pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu to stop the airstrikes in Gaza, as families could say "our relatives died from Israeli bombs - please stop them," Clarke added. . /Sky News
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