President Trump said it is possible that less than 20 Hamas-held Israeli hostages are still alive, fewer than previously thought, he said this week.

For the past few months, it’s been widely reported that an estimated 50 Israelis remain in Hamas captivity , with at least 20 believed to still be alive.

“So now they have 20,” Trump told reporters Friday during a press conference in the Oval Office. “But the 20 is actually probably not 20, because a couple maybe aren’t around any longer,” he added, without elaborating. “It’s a terrible thing.”

AP

“The situation has to end, it’s extortion and it has to end,” he went on to say. “I actually think they’re safer in many ways if you went in and you really went in fast,” he said in an apparent reference to freeing the hostages militarily inste

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