Arrived in Israel around 3pm local time. Immediately visible were signs about the hostages.

Upon arriving at the hotel in Jaffa, I got to listen to two speakers. One was a journalist for Ha’aretz, and the other was a captain in an intelligence unit who was in charge of interrogating Hamas captives and other residents of Gaza. Unfortunately, I didn’t take a lot of notes. I will try to remember things as best I can. I am going to report what I heard. You will have to judge for yourself what you want to believe. Most of what they said you are able to read in American and Israeli papers. The captain did tell us that as aid trucks are coming into Gaza, they are being intercepted by Hamas where they are driven to Hamas warehouses. From there they sell the food to Gazans for outrageous prices. Since these people don’t have any money, Hamas gives them script that they can use, but they have to do things for Hamas to get the script. The IDF countered this by printing up a bunch of script and dropping it in Gaza. I questioned how could this be happening when we’re supposed to be defeating Hamas. Basically the reality is that Hamas is not being defeated. Our soldiers are mainly operating in Rafah so there is a resurgence of Hamas in other areas. Both speakers acknowledge that any hostage deal at this time is dead.

After these talks, we went out to eat at an incredible Moroccan restaurant that was a fusion blend of Moroccan and Israeli food. One of the best meals I’ve ever had in Israel. After dinner, we went to hostage Square. Every Saturday evening there is a huge demonstration. There were quite a number of people in the square. Some were praying, others just sitting. Here are some pictures from the Square. First there is a picture of our server at the Moroccan restaurant.

That was the end of the activities for this day.