Mother and father of freed Hamas hostages give particulars of ordeal

Mother and father of 4 younger feminine Israeli hostages free of Hamas captivity in Gaza have instructed the BBC about how their daughters had been abused, together with being starved, intimidated and threatened by armed males, and compelled to cook dinner and clear.

They recounted how the hostages had been held in underground tunnels and buildings, witnessed bodily abuse and had been made to take part in Hamas propaganda movies, together with, in a single case, by faking her personal dying.

They stated the ladies discovered energy by way of sharing tales, drawing and holding a diary.

Not one of the ladies have given interviews to the media since their launch, and their dad and mom say the complete particulars of what they endured are nonetheless rising. There are additionally issues they can not talk about attributable to fears it may put the hostages nonetheless in Gaza in danger.

Three of the 4 ladies whose dad and mom spoke to the BBC had been feminine troopers kidnapped by Hamas from the Nahal Ouncesarmy base close to Gaza on 7 October 2023.

The hostages’ entry to meals and their remedy by male guards diversified over the 15 months they had been held, their dad and mom stated. They had been moved between areas, hardly ever seeing daylight.

“It was very completely different between the locations that she went – it might be an excellent tunnel, it might be a really unhealthy tunnel. It might be an excellent home or a foul home,” stated the daddy of Agam Berger, 20, a soldier who had been at Nahal Oz.

A number of the locations had good meals, some had “very unhealthy meals… they only tried to outlive,” Shlomi Berger stated.

“They [and their captors] needed to run away from one place to a different as a result of they’re in a struggle zone there. It was very harmful to be there,” stated Orly Gilboa, whose daughter Daniella was additionally kidnapped from the bottom.

When Daniella watched the launch of three male hostages final week – who got here out skinny and emaciated – she instructed her mom: “If I had been launched two months in the past I’d have in all probability appeared like them.”

“She obtained thinner, she misplaced a number of her weight by way of the captivity. However within the final two months they got a number of meals to achieve weight,” Ms Gilboa says.

Different dad and mom have additionally reported vital weight reduction. Meirav Leshem Gonen’s daughter was taken by Hamas from the Nova music pageant.

Romi, 24, was launched within the first week of the ceasefire in January – she had misplaced “20% of her physique weight”, says her mom.

Ms Gilboa says the toughest factor she endured was seeing a video that steered her daughter had been killed. Her captors poured powder on her so she appeared like she was coated in plaster, as if she was killed in an Israeli navy strike.

“I feel everybody who noticed it believed it, however I simply stored telling myself that it may possibly’t be,” she instructed the BBC.

The struggle was triggered by Hamas’s unprecedented assault on Israel on 7 October 2023, when gunmen killed about 1,200 folks and took one other 251 hostage.

Greater than 48,230 folks have been killed in Gaza since, in accordance with the territory’s Hamas-run well being ministry. About two-thirds of Gaza’s buildings have been destroyed or broken, estimates the UN.

To this point, 16 Israeli and 5 Thai hostages have been exchanged for greater than 600 Palestinian prisoners held in Israel beneath the ceasefire deal that started on 19 January.

Mr Berger says his daughter, Agam, was threatened by her captors and witnessed bodily abuse whereas in captivity.

“Typically they tortured different feminine hostages in entrance of her eyes,” he says, referring particularly to an assault on Amit Soussana, a former hostage who was launched in November 2023.

Mr Berger says his daughter instructed him how they had been consistently watched over by armed males, “taking part in on a regular basis with their weapons and their hand grenades”.

He says the male captors handled the ladies with “massive disrespect”, together with forcing them to scrub and put together meals.

“That was actually bothering her. She’s a woman that if she has one thing to say, she’ll say it. She’s not shy. And typically she instructed them what she was fascinated about them and their behaviour,” he says.

He provides that in a small act of resistance, Agam had refused to carry out any jobs on the Sabbath, the Jewish day of relaxation. The boys detaining her accepted this.

They had been additionally not allowed to talk loudly.

“When Agam got here [back to Israel] she wished to talk on a regular basis… After a day, she had no voice as a result of she’d spoken a lot,” Mr Berger says.

Yoni Levy, whose daughter Naama, 20, was additionally taken from the military base, says she was typically held in areas the place there was a TV or radio taking part in.

As soon as, Naama noticed her father speaking on TV. “It gave her a number of hope and optimism… that no person would neglect her, and we’ll do no matter is required to take her out of this hell.”

He says for Naama, the Hamas assault on the military base was “was far more traumatic than the captivity itself”.

“It might change however at this stage we predict that that is essentially the most tragic day that she’s talked about,” Mr Levy says.

Footage of Naama that day exhibits her and different feminine troopers in bloodstained clothes surrounded by armed males in a room on the base earlier than being compelled right into a car and brought to Gaza.

The three feminine troopers whose dad and mom spoke to the BBC are amongst 5 from an all-women unarmed navy unit at Nahal Ouncesfreed within the first spherical of the ceasefire.

Members of the unit, identified in Hebrew as Tatzpitaniyot, are tasked with observing the Gaza border and in search of indicators of something suspicious. Survivors and kin of a few of these killed that day say that that they had been warning for months that Hamas had been getting ready for an assault.

Just a few days earlier than the 7 October assault, Daniella had been at house on a break from service. She had instructed her mom then: “Mummy, once I return to the military, there’s going to be a struggle.”

“I did not suppose it was going to be such a struggle and naturally that my daughter could be taken hostage,” Ms Gilboa says.

Ms Gilboa and the households of the 2 different observers who spoke to the BBC say they’re becoming a member of requires an inquiry into what occurred.

They are saying their daughters stay involved concerning the situations of these nonetheless in Gaza and have referred to as for the ceasefire to proceed.

In the meantime, Ms Leshem Gonen says she remains to be studying what occurred to her daughter Romi.

She was shot on the Nova music pageant and her mom says she was not correctly handled, leaving her with “an open wound the place she may see the bone”.

“That is one thing we are able to know and that she speaks about. The opposite issues, I feel it would take time.”

Ms Leshem Gonen says Romi described her launch within the first week of the truce as “intimidating” and “scary”. She was surrounded by gunmen and crowds. However the second of their reunion was “so highly effective”.

The dad and mom additionally described how their daughters had discovered methods to get by way of every day in captivity – by way of drawing, making notes or sharing tales with one another.

“They wrote as a lot as they may, day by day – what was taking place, the place had been they shifting, who had been the guards and issues like that,” says Mr Berger.

Whereas in captivity, the younger ladies had dreamt concerning the issues they wished to do once they obtained house: getting a haircut and consuming sushi.

Daniella had drawn a butterfly with the phrase “freedom” whereas in captivity – she now has that tattooed on her arm.

They’re adapting to life again in Israel, and their households say they’re taking the restoration step-by-step.

The second of reunion along with his daughter Naama remains to be a blur, says Mr Levy, however he remembers the emotion.

“The sensation was that… I’ll maintain you now, and all the things’s going to be OK. Daddy’s right here. That is all. After which all the things was quiet.”

Extra reporting by Naomi Scherbel-Ball