The condition of three hostages released by Hamas on Saturday sparked outrage in Israel.
Over the weekend, Or Levy, Ohad Ben Ami, and Eli Sharabi returned to Israel as part of the fifth wave of prisoner exchanges between the Jewish nation and Hamas under the terms of the latest cease-fire. In return, Israel released 183 Palestinian prisoners to Hamas.
The Jewish prisoners suffered greatly while they were under Hamas captivity, according to family members who wept over the change in their loved ones’ appearance since they were taken hostage by the terrorist group at an Israeli music festival roughly sixteen months ago.
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“He’s certainly returning another person,” Levy’s brother Tal told Israel television.
“He looks really, really terrible. It’s really sad for me to see him like that,” Ami’s mother-in-law, Michal Cohen, said on Israeli television as she saw the first images of her gaunt son being released by Hamas.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli President Isaac Herzog also grieved the physical condition of all three men, with the president saying they were "returning after 491 days of hell, starved, emaciated and pained".
Hamas terrorists often hold captives in underground tunnels amid filthy conditions, giving them scant food and water, while sexually assaulting and raping female prisoners, according to hostages who have survived captivity and been released to Israel.
Levy’s brother had previously told the Washington Examiner hostages are being held in “inhumane conditions” in captivity.
“We know that [the hostages] barely eat, they live in horrible conditions without air, without water, sleeping on the dirty, dirty floor, and they do not shower them. They barely have time to go to the bathroom, and if they do, it’s usually with one of the terrorists looking at them,” Michael Levy said in April 2024.
Or Levy’s return home from Gaza Saturday was shadowed by the absence of his wife, Eynav, who was murdered by Hamas at the Nova music festival on Oct. 7, 2023.
“That’s the most difficult thing for me, knowing that he lost Eynav. And the fact that he’s there and thinks about Eynav, and what she’s been through. That’s the toughest thing for me,” Michael Levy said of his brother’s time in captivity.
All of the Israel hostages released Saturday lost other family relatives during the Oct. 7 attack or saw other relatives taken prisoner by Hamas.
Ami’s wife, Raz Ben, was taken hostage by Hamas but was released in Nov. 2023.
Sharabyi’s wife, Lianne and their two daughters, Noiya and Yahel, were murdered during the attack. His brother Yossi was also taken hostage in Gaza, where he was killed in an Israeli airstrike.
Sharabi's brother-in-law, Steve Brisley, criticized the theatrical manner in which the hostages were released by Hamas in comments to BBC News.
The three captives filed onto a stage and were ordered to give speeches by Hamas officials before being handed over to the Red Cross for their return to Israel.
It was "incredibly difficult" to see Shrabi "thin and gaunt" being paraded by Hamas, Brisley said.
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"It's the light that's gone from his eyes that's really struck home for me," he added.
More than 70 hostages are still being held in Gaza, although more than 30 of them have died in captivity, according to Israel.