Israel-Hamas war latest update: Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday slammed the “cruel psychological propaganda” of Hamas after the militant group released a video of three Israeli women hostages it has been holding since the brutal October 7 attack.

“This is cruel psychological propaganda by Hamas-ISIS. We embrace the families and are doing everything to return all of the captives and missing to their families,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement posted on Twitter, now renamed X.

The Israeli PM’s office further said that he is reaching out to the three women hostages in an embrace. The PMO also identified the three women hostages as Rimon Kirsht, Danielle Aloni, and Lena Trupanov. They were captured by Hamas militants after their surprise attack on October 7.

“To Yelena Trupanob, Daniel Aloni and Rimon Kirsht, who were abducted by Hamas, which is committing war crimes. I embrace you. Our hearts are with you and the other the captives. We are doing everything to bring home all of the captives and missing,” the statement from PMO said.

Reacting to the Hamas video, Mark Regev, a senior advisor to Israeli Prime Minister said that “the only good thing about this video is we have visual proof these women are alive.”

“We don’t believe that Hamas is going to release these hostages because suddenly Hamas is becoming boy scouts or a humanitarian organisation… Hamas is a brutal, ruthless, extreme, barbaric organisation… We’ve seen the sort of violence they’re capable of first-hand,” he said in an interview with BBC.

Meanwhile, Israel Defence Forces continued to pound Gaza with air bombardment along with a ground assault. According to latest reports from local and international media, Israeli military tanks have now gone into deeper areas of the Hamas-controlled enclave.

Israel declared a war against Hamas and its military has been pounding Gaza with air strikes since the brutal October 7 Hamas attack that killed more than 1,400 people, including children, women and foreign nationals. The militants also kidnapped at least 239 people during the attack.