“Sorry” asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this evening to the families of the six Israeli hostages who were found dead in the Gaza Strip and buried yesterday and today.

Addressing the hostages’ relatives in a rare press conference, Netanyahu said: “Slet me apologize for not bringing them back alive. We were close but we didn’t make it.”

He denied, however, that the hostages were killed because of Israel’s insistence on maintaining control of the strategic corridor. “It happened because Hamas doesn’t want a deal,” he said.

The Israeli prime minister warned that Israel will not accept the “slaughter” of the six hostages and the Palestinian organization Hamas “he will pay a very heavy price.”

He also reiterated that Israel must retain control of the Philadelphia Corridor; of a narrow strip of land on Gaza’s border with Egypt. “The implementation of the war objectives goes through the Philadelphia Corridor,” he said.

The issue of control of that area has blocked negotiations to reach a Gaza ceasefire and the release of hostages, after Hamas demands that the Israeli army withdraw from the enclave’s border with Egypt.

Earlier today, Israel’s prime minister reportedly called today’s general strike in Israel, in which hundreds of thousands of Israelis called on the government to reach an agreement to free the remaining Israeli hostages and for a cease-fire in Gaza, “shameful.” and that it actually shows support for Hamas.