'Sleepless nights' for family of Tanzanian Hamas hostage

Dar es Salaam. The father of a Tanzanian national taken hostage by Hamas said Tuesday he is praying for a truce in Gaza as the family endures "sleepless nights" anxiously waiting for news.

The Israeli government has named Tanzanians Joshua Loitu Mollel and Clemence Felix Mtenga as among at least 240 people seized by Hamas fighters in their bloody October 7 raids on Israel.

The pair were in the country for an agricultural internship programme, the Israeli government said on X, formerly Twitter, on October 29.

Tanzania's government has yet to confirm they were taken hostage, saying only that two of its nationals in Israel were missing.

"I would love to see the two fighting sides agree to end war and release all hostages," Joshua's father Loitu Mollel told AFP by phone.

"I feel bad all the time because my son is not a warrior. He just went for training but is now in trouble," he added.

Mollel said his 21-year-old son was living in Nahal Oz, a kibbutz close to Gaza that was one of the areas attacked by the Palestinian militant group.

The 50-year-old said he last spoke to his son on the evening of October 5, just two days before the Hamas onslaught.

Israeli authorities say more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians, were killed in an attack launched by Hamas on October 7 from the Gaza Strip.

In response, the Israeli military has pounded Gaza, where the Hamas-controlled health ministry says more than 8,500 have been killed, many of them children.

'Difficult moments'

"I have been going through difficult moments since then with sleepless nights. As parents, we are having very challenging times to live without any clue of the safety of our son," Mollel said.

A teacher by profession who works as an education officer in the northern Manyara region of Tanzania, Mollel described his son as "polite, obedient and serious" about his work.

Joshua -- the oldest of five children -- had finished a diploma in agriculture studies from a college in the eastern Tanzanian city of Morogoro and then left for Israel in September.

Mollel said once the Israeli internship was finished, Joshua wanted to find his fortune in agriculture as either a farmer or an expert in the field.

"My relatives and friends have been consoling us and we ask them to keep Joshua in their prayers so that he returns home safely," he said, adding that the Tanzanian government had been in regular contact with the family.

Last Thursday, the foreign ministry said it was aware of "two missing Tanzanian nationals who are among 260 Tanzanian students studying modern agriculture methods and techniques in Israel".

"The government has been working with relevant authorities and other parties to ascertain their whereabouts and bring them to safety," it said in a statement.

"These efforts are ongoing and the ministry is in constant communication with their families to update them on these efforts."

So far, nine Tanzanians living in Israel have returned home with the assistance of the government, it said.