The IDF's new Operation Gideon's Chariot poses an extreme threat to the 58 remaining hostages, the Hostage Families Forum said on Sunday.
The statement was issued shortly after the military's announcement that had increased their expansion of the Gaza invasion over the weekend.
The military has struck 670 Hamas targets, killing dozens of terrorists in the process.
The forum's statement sourced a position paper by Prof. Hagai Levine, Head of the Hostage Families Forum health team, and former Mossad director, Tamir Pardo, which states that the resumption of the fighting threatens the safety of living hostages and increases the difficulty of recovering the dead hostages' bodies, as it may no longer be possible to recover their remains.
"The living hostages face immediate mortal danger, and we risk losing the deceased forever. If we continue this way, we will lose both the living and the dead," said Levine. "Israel can now choose life and bring back all the hostages. This is the moment to decide whether to save lives or abandon them."
Citing the words of the freed hostages
The paper also sourced testimonies from freed hostages who described their treatment by their captors as worsening following military strikes. This includes less food provided to them and enduring physical abuse. It also concludes that the condition of living hostages will worsen both mentally, due to feelings of abandonment and prolonging of captivity, and physically, due to the difficult environmental conditions and hostile treatment from Hamas terrorists.
The paper also describes the hostages' sense of abandonment being intensified when they realize that some of their fellow captives were released while they are still held in the Gaza Strip. Physical harm to them includes structural collapse, toxic cases, and treatment by Hamas captors.
A New York Times report from March stated that 41 hostages were murdered while in captivity during the fighting.
Yonah Jeremy Bob contributed to this report.