CNN's Jake Tapper sat down on Monday with six men and women whose loved ones were taken hostage by the Hamas terror organization and heard about their feelings and experiences.
Moshe Levi, the brother-in-law of hostage Omri Miran, spoke of his expectations from the US government and international community: "We hope to hear this week that negotiations are still in full force, that there is an approach to pressure Hamas, through Qatar and Egypt, through other stakeholders, possibly Russia or Turkey, to ensure that Hamas agrees to the framework."
He added: "There is an agreement on the table, Hamas refuses to agree to it, and we have to use all the levers. I hope American lawmakers will make the effort to pressure whoever they can, especially Qatar, to allow Hamas to free the Palestinians, who are also captives of Hamas, and of course our loved ones."
Regarding the US efforts to achieve a deal, Daniel Lifshitz, whose grandfather is still in captivity and whose grandmother was released, said that in the last month, he's seen great progress in Biden's push for the hostages' release. With this, he added: "Imagine, my grandfather, a great-grandfather to my son, 84 years old, held hostage in Gaza for 157 days. In my family, the mixed feeling is so overwhelming, from one side the joy of my grandma coming back, but my grandfather is still there, the family is ripped apart."
Sharon Sharabi, whose brother was killed in captivity, said that while his brother was probably killed in an Israeli strike, they still consider him murdered by Hamas, being that the terror organization dragged him to the combat zone.
Oriya Yahbess, the cousin of hostage Yarden Bibas, whose one-year-old son, Kfir, is the youngest hostage, told Tapper how there is still hope for her loved ones to return: "We always have hope because we have nothing else to grab for, so hope is what's holding us. Our lives stopped on the 7th of October. And when I say 'our lives' it's not just his sister and his mother, we're talking about cousins, we're talking about grandfathers, we're talking about grandmothers. The whole family is affected."
Oriya choked up when talking about Yarden's 4-year-old niece who was best friends with his son Ariel, and keeps asking about him.
After mentioning Sara Netanyahu's plea to the mother of the Emir of Qatar to press for the release of the female hostages, Yahbess turned to the wives of world leaders: "As mothers, please join Sara Netanyahu and do the same thing. Let us all end this, at least for the women and children. And I want to say to the American public, I want them to look at these children and remember their faces, and when you put your kids to sleep, please remember, I don't know how they slept tonight. This is something that can't go on."