The news that Hamas was planning to dig up corpses from an old British cemetery in the Gaza Strip to pressure the British government to turn against Israel shines a spotlight on a question that needs to be asked: How did dead people come to be regarded as “hostages”?
In normal discourse and popular culture, a hostage is typically a person taken prisoner and held bound in some basement—alive—while the kidnappers wait to see if their demands will be met.
A person who is kidnapped and murdered is not normally referred to as a “hostage.” He or she is referred to as dead—as a murder victim.
Source:
Hamas is exploiting dead hostages, by Moshe Phillips/JNS, August 20, 2024