Still frail less than a week after his release from Hamas captivity, and processing the news that his wife, Eynav, was killed during the militants’ attack on 7 October 2023, Or Levy told a crowd in Tel Aviv’s Hostages Square that he had insisted his family and doctors allow him to come.
At the start of the week the truce looked like it was in danger of collapsing after Hamas said it would suspend this weekend’s scheduled release of three more hostages unless alleged Israeli violations, including the continued killing of Palestinians in Gaza, were addressed.
Ran Gilboa, the father of the freed soldier Daniella Gilboa, 20, told the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth this week: “At the height of the war, there was no water, and Daniella and her friends were forced to drink filthy groundwater, causing her to contract a severe bacterial stomach infection, and she spent two weeks hovering between life and death.
The three men appeared more frail than the 13 Israelis and five Thai citizens previously released in the Gaza war’s ceasefire, sparking fears that if Hamas is freeing the healthiest captives first, the next to return will be in even worse shape.
The hostages’ stories have increased public pressure on Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to ensure the fragile deal does not collapse, despite calls to resume the fighting from far-right members of the coalition that have threatened to collapse his government.
