An Israeli hostage freed by the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas said she was initially well fed during her captivity, until conditions worsened and people went hungry.
In one of the first interviews with freed hostages, Ruti Munder, 78, told Israeli broadcaster Channel 13 on Monday that she spent all her time with her daughter, Keren, and her grandson, Ohad Munder-Zichri, who celebrated his ninth birthday in captivity.
This report increases the amount of information about the experience of hostages detained in Gaza, the Associated Press (AP) reported on Tuesday.
Munder was kidnapped on October 7 from her home in Nir Oz, a kibbutz in southern Israel. Her husband, Avraham, also 78, was also taken hostage and remains in Gaza, while her son was killed in the attack.
At first they ate “chicken and rice, all kinds of preserves and cheese,” Munder explained to Channel 13. The adults started drinking tea in the morning and at night and the children ate sweets.
But the ‘menu’ changed when “the economic situation was not good and people went hungry.”
Israel has maintained a strict siege on Gaza since the start of the war, causing shortages of food, fuel and other basic items.
Munder, who was released on Friday, returned in good physical condition, like most of the other prisoners. But one of the freed hostages, an 84-year-old woman, was hospitalized in life-threatening conditions after not receiving proper care during captivity, according to doctors.
Most of the freed hostages have remained out of public view since their return and most of the details about their situation and experience in Gaza come from relatives who have visited them.
The elderly woman confirmed the stories of relatives of other freed hostages, explaining that she slept in plastic chairs, covered with a sheet, although not everyone had access to one.
Also Monday, the aunt of a 25-year-old Russian-Israeli hostage who was freed from Gaza on Sunday said her nephew fled his captors and hid in Gaza for a few days before being recaptured.
“He said the terrorists took him to a building. But the building was destroyed. [por um bombardeamento israelita] and managed to escape,” said Yelena Magid, Roni Krivoi’s aunt, to Kan radio, pointing out that the escape lasted around four days.
Eitan Yahalomi’s aunt, Devorah Cohen, told the French press that her 12-year-old nephew was sometimes kept alone, but when he was with other people, his captors threatened him with a gun every time the children cried, to keep them dumbed down.
“The Hamas terrorists forced him to watch horror movies, the kind that no one wants to see,” he said.
Thanks to a truce in which Qatar was the main mediator, since last Friday Hamas has released a dozen women and children sent to the Gaza Strip daily after the surprise attack on October 7, in exchange for the release of three more Palestinian prisoners, most of whom are women and teenagers.
Israel declared war on Hamas on October 7, following an attack by the Islamic group, which included the launching of more than 4,000 rockets and the infiltration of nearly 3,000 militants, who killed some 1,200 people and kidnapped more than 240 from communities. Israelis near Gaza. Band.
Since then, Israel’s air, naval and ground forces have counterattacked in the Palestinian enclave, where more than 15,000 people have died, according to authorities in the Gaza Strip, controlled since 2007 by Hamas, most of them children and women. and it is estimated that more than seven thousand people are missing under the rubble.
Source: TSF
