Hamas Helps Release Another Gaza Hostage: a Lioness

Five days after the release of the BBC journalist Alan Johnston, another high-profile hostage was freed today from the Gaza Strip - a lioness called Sabrina.

She was found malnourished and with four missing teeth during a Hamas raid on the hideout of a criminal gang. Sabrina was returned to Gaza zoo - from where she was seized in November 2005 - and was being fed on minced meat to restore her strength.

Sabrina was only a few months old when she was kidnapped along with two Arabic-speaking parrots. The director of the zoo offered a reward for her return, but there had been little word about her whereabouts and growing concern about her safety.

Sabrina's captors were reported to be charging people 50p to be photographed beside her.

The animal's kidnapping was a story that Johnston himself covered before he was seized in March.

It was thought Sabrina was taken as a show of strength by the gang. Her brother Sakher fought off the kidnappers.

At the time of her capture, Johnston told the BBC's website that human abductions in the Gaza Strip usually ended with the victim being freed quickly and unharmed.

Johnston was released last week in good health after 114 days. Sabrina was held for more than 20 months, and recovered only after an exchange of fire between Hamas militiamen and the gang.

As well as the two-year-old lioness, Hamas seized drugs and a weapons cache that had been the target of the raid. There was no word on the Arabic-speaking parrots.

The releases of both Johnston and Sabrina have been credited to Hamas taking control of Gaza.

Sabrina was reunited today with Sakher at Gaza zoo. "We will start a long, arduous treatment to ensure she can survive," said the zoo's vet, Soud al-Shawaa. "She will only eat minced meat from now on so we feel sorry for her ... They should punish the criminals who did this to her."

Zoos have repeatedly been caught up in unrest in Gaza. In 2004 several animals were killed when Gaza's previous zoo, in the border town of Rafah, was destroyed by the Israeli army.

In the West Bank town of Qalqiliya in 2002, three zebras died of tear gas inhalation and a giraffe was killed during a riot against Israeli security forces.