UK to fly surveillance flights to locate hostages in Gaza

London: The United Kingdom has informed that it is to perform surveillance flights over Gaza to locate hostages held by Hamas since the start of the war on October 7, reports Agence France-Presse, citing Britain's defence ministry.

Israeli authorities claim that Hamas had taken around 240 foreigners hostage, and only 110 have been freed during the week-long truce.

On Friday, Israel announced that it resumed fighting inside Palestine, accusing Hamas of violating the ceasefire. The resumption of combat operations has halted the release of more than 130 more captives held by Hamas, Israel claimed.

According to the UK, at least 12 British nationals were killed in the October attacks, while another five are missing. Israeli officials said that in the said attack, around 1200 civilians were killed.

However, there is no confirmation of the number of captives being kept under Hamas.

AFP reports that Israel responded to the October 7 attack, pledging to eliminate Hamas, and the conflict that followed took more than 15,000 lives. The count was released by Hamas.

Back to the UK's surveillance, London has not revealed when its military surveillance flights would start. However, it promised that the flights would be unarmed and would be focusing only on hostage recovery.

UK Ministry of Defence said in a statement, "In support of the ongoing hostage rescue activity, the UK Ministry of Defence will conduct surveillance flights over the Eastern Mediterranean, including operating in air space over Israel and Gaza," AFP quoted.

"Surveillance aircraft will be unarmed, do not have a combat role, and will be tasked solely to locate hostages," the ministry added.

"Only information relating to hostage rescue will be passed to the relevant authorities responsible for hostage rescue."