JERUSALEM, Aug 5, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Monday that the plight of hostages held in Gaza should top the global agenda, ahead of a UN Security Council session on the issue.

"The world must put an end to the phenomenon of kidnapping civilians. It must be front and centre on the world stage," Saar told a press briefing.

"I will head to New York tonight to participate in a special UN Security Council session that I initiated, taking place tomorrow (Tuesday) on the situation of the hostages," the minister added.

Of the 251 hostages seized during Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the ongoing Gaza war, 49 are still held in the Palestinian territory, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

The UN session was called after Palestinian militant group Hamas and its ally Islamic Jihad had published last week three videos showing two hostages who appear weak and emaciated, causing deep shock and distress in Israel.

The videos renewed a public debate in Israel over the urgency of securing a ceasefire and hostage release deal, as the war nears its 23rd month.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday he was "shocked" by the "horror videos of our precious sons".

"You see them withering away in tunnels. But the Hamas monster... have all the food they need. They starve them like Nazis starved the Jews," said Netanyahu, who has faced mounting international pressure to halt the war.

Netanyahu said he had asked the International Committee of the Red Cross, which oversaw past hostage releases during short-lived truces in the war, to provide food and medical treatment to Israeli hostages there.

Abu Obeida, spokesman of Hamas' armed wing the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, said the group was willing to allow Red Cross access to the hostages in exchange for permanent humanitarian access for food and medicine into all of Gaza.