The Islamist group Hamas rejected what it called a “false narrative and fabricated story” about a Yazidi woman Israel said it freed in the Gaza Strip in a covert operation involving Israel, the United States and Iraq.
The woman, who Israeli authorities said was forcibly taken when she was 11 and sold to a Hamas member, was never kidnapped or sold, and left the Gaza Strip with the knowledge of Hamas authorities, the Israeli communications office said. enclave government, administered by the group.
It said the 25-year-old woman, identified as Fawzia Sido, was married to a Palestinian man who was fighting alongside opposition forces in Syria when he was killed. She later moved to live with her mother in Turkey, before traveling to Egypt, where she continued living with her stepmother and later entered the enclave illegally.
Years after moving to the Gaza Strip, she married her husband’s brother before he was killed during the current Israeli offensive, Hamas said.
“She requested contact with her family because she felt increasingly unsafe in the Gaza Strip, amid intense shelling and brutal attacks by the Israeli occupation. She asked to be removed from there, especially after her husband was martyred,” the Gaza press office said.
“The Yazidi woman left government facilities to leave on her own, with the knowledge of her late husband’s family and the Palestinian government. The occupation did not ‘rescue’ her, and falsely claimed this in a statement to deceive public opinion,” he added.
On Thursday (3), the Israeli military said it had coordinated with the US embassy in Jerusalem and “other international actors” an operation to free Sido.
This content was originally published in Hamas denies kidnapping and says Yazidi woman’s departure from Gaza was voluntary on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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