TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — After 16 months of excruciating uncertainty, Idit Ohel lastly obtained phrase this week that her 24-year-old son, a hostage in Gaza, remains to be alive.
She stated she fainted upon listening to the brutal particulars of his captivity from freed hostages who had been held with him by Hamas since Oct. 7, 2023. Certain by chains in an underground tunnel, Alon Ohel has subsisted on a bit of bread or much less every day.
“He hasn’t seen sunlight in 493 days,” she informed reporters on Monday.
As the delicate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas appears more and more liable to falling aside — Hamas says it won’t free three hostages on Saturday as deliberate, and Israel says it’s able to resume the warfare if it doesn’t — households of the hostages are struggling to keep up hope. They’re pleading with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to surrender on the ceasefire framework, and to hurry up the timeline of releases if attainable.
Their worries concerning the ceasefire collapsing have been exacerbated by President Donald Trump’s demand that the entire hostages be freed by Saturday — and his insistence that Gaza be emptied of all Palestinians and redeveloped as a vacationer enclave managed by the USA.
The emaciated state of three hostages launched final Saturday has infuriated Israelis and terrified households of the remaining hostages, particularly as extra particulars come out concerning the circumstances of their captivity.
The scenario is very troublesome for family members of hostages who are usually not on the listing of 33 hostages anticipated to be launched within the ceasefire’s first, six-week section, which started on Jan. 19. The settlement requires Israel to free 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, whose households are additionally anxious about how their enemy treats them.
Two hostages launched on Saturday, Or Levy and Eli Sharabi, had been held along with Alon Ohel, and a fourth hostage, Eliya Cohen. The 4 had been held underground since their kidnapping, Idit Ohel stated.
Cohen is anticipated to be launched within the ceasefire’s first stage; Ohel could be freed within the second stage, if Israel and Hamas attain that time.
Levy, Ohel, and Cohen had been kidnapped from a bomb shelter close to a music pageant in southern Israel, together with Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an American-Israeli who was killed in captivity in August.
“It breaks my heart to know he was chained and to know what happened to him in the tunnels from people in the tunnels,” Cohen’s fiancée, Ziv Abud, 27, informed reporters on Tuesday.
The returned hostages stated that Cohen had misplaced greater than 20 kilograms (44 kilos) and had a bullet in his leg that didn’t obtain medical consideration. Whereas they had been with him, Cohen was unaware that Abud had survived the Hamas assault on the bomb shelter the place they had been hiding.
In the course of the Oct. 7 assault, militants tossed grenades and sprayed bullets contained in the concrete bomb shelter close to the music pageant, the place nearly 30 individuals had crammed inside. No less than 16 individuals contained in the shelter had been killed.
Abud stated she was protected by the crush of our bodies above her. Going out and in of consciousness, she spent hours laying beneath the our bodies of her nephew and his girlfriend.
For households of hostages who are usually not scheduled for launch within the first section of the ceasefire, its uncertainty is much more troublesome to bear.
Israel and Hamas had been set final week to start talks on a second section of the ceasefire that would come with an finish to the warfare and the discharge of the remaining hostages. However these efforts have been frozen whereas the 2 sides commerce accusations about whether or not the opposite resides as much as the phrases of the primary section.
Tamir Nimrodi, 20, an Israeli soldier kidnapped from his publish at a predominant crossing between Israel and Gaza, is just not on the listing to be freed within the first stage.
His mom, Herut, stated Hamas’ plan to delay the following hostage launch got here as a shock.
“We try to analyze it, think, what are the possibilities? Is this psychological terrorism they are pulling on us?” she stated.
It’s been troublesome watching the hostage releases over the previous few weeks, Nimrodi stated, particularly the emotional movies of hostages reuniting with their households.
On the one hand, every reunion is a step nearer to bringing again her son, whom she described as a artistic one that loves driving horses and consuming candy cocktails made with pineapple juice. However Nimrodi doesn’t know if her son, who additionally holds German citizenship, is alive.
The opposite two troopers he was kidnapped with had been killed, and she or he has not obtained any signal of life from him.
“I know there is a chance I won’t get to the point where I can hold my son,” she stated.
In line with Israeli media, returning hostages have supplied proof of life for no less than seven Israeli hostages, together with Cohen and Ohel.
Nimrodi doesn’t know what’s worse — to consider her son is lifeless, or to obtain data that he’s alive, however held in circumstances like Alon Ohel. “I’m scared if Tamir is still alive, I have no idea what he’s going through, I’m scared to even imagine,” she stated.
Alon, who additionally has German and Serbian citizenship, is a gifted pianist. The household has positioned pianos throughout Israel in his honor, a lot of that are yellow, the colour related to the battle for the hostages.
The household marked Alon’s second birthday in captivity on Monday night in Tel Aviv, the place his mom addressed the Israeli authorities. “After all the sights you saw, after all the testimonies you heard from the survivors of captivity, how do you allow this situation to continue?” she stated.
Alon did bear in mind his youthful sister, Inbar, had a birthday on Saturday and delivered her a message by means of the hostages who had been launched that day.
“She got her birthday wish, to hear from her brother, which is incredible,” Idit stated, by means of tears.