JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli Maya Regev lay badly wounded in a nondescript home in Gaza, her leg mangled from a gunshot, below orders to not make a sound.
The 21-year-old begged her captors to let her youthful brother Itay, who was being held in a room close by, be a part of her whereas the bandages on her leg had been changed.
It was days after Hamas Islamists rampaged by way of southern Israel in a killing and hostage-taking spree on Oct. 7 that triggered the warfare in Gaza. The siblings had been shot and wounded as they tried to flee an out of doors music competition turned killing subject. They had been thrown right into a pickup and brought away with their pal, Omer Shem Tov.
“Itay and Omer stroll in. And so they started eradicating the bandages. And I am screaming and Omer is holding my hand and protecting my mouth,” a tearful Maya recalled throughout an interview with Uvda, a current-affairs programme on Israel’s Channel 12 TV.
Itay, 18, informed how days earlier a “scared and sweaty physician” painfully eliminated the bullet from his leg with out anaesthesia, whereas he was instructed to stay quiet or be killed.
Maya’s damage was extra extreme and he or she says she was finally snuck right into a Gaza hospital. Her dangling foot was re-attached in surgical procedure, however sideways, at an unnatural angle. She gave her interview in a wheelchair, her leg in a solid.
The Regev siblings had been amongst greater than 100 hostages freed in a week-long ceasefire in late November. Shem Tov stays in captivity with almost 130 others. Some have been declared useless in absentia by Israeli authorities.
Whereas being handled within the hospital, Maya stated she was saved close to one other wounded Israeli hostage, Man Iluz. The 2 spoke about returning dwelling – what they’d do, what they’d eat. However Iluz died within the hospital.
“At first I refused to consider. Earlier than they took him away I stated I’ve to see, like, that it is actually him. I’ve the obligation to go converse to his household when that is over. I am the one one who knew what actually occurred to him.”
Itay stated that he and Omer within the meantime had been taken to a special home, compelled to decorate as Muslim ladies so they would not be acknowledged as they walked in the dead of night of evening.
From the hospital Maya wrote her brother and Omer a be aware and requested it’s delivered. She stated she argued along with her captors, demanding that she hear again.
Itay acquired it.
“They got here one time with a be aware, a be aware from Maya, by which she wrote me the place she is, what she goes by way of. She stated she loves me, requested me to remain robust, for the household, for everybody,” he stated.
He despatched a response.
“They introduced me a be aware that they (Itay and Omer) wrote me, and I knew it was actually from them as a result of I acknowledged the handwriting and my brother known as me by my nickname,” Maya stated.
Itay calls his sister patcha.
“It was a light-weight, a small mild in all of the darkness, that I hear from my little brother and from Omer, that I perceive they’re okay.”
They continued corresponding.
“These notes gave a lot power, like within the small second that I really feel a bit like I’m diving into dangerous ideas, I simply held Maya’s be aware, learn it like ten instances, and it might give me power,” Itay stated.
For the reason that transient ceasefire, Israel has pushed forward with its devastating marketing campaign in Gaza, saying that army strain is required to free the remaining hostages.
Israel’s air and artillery bombardment has killed greater than 21,800 folks in keeping with well being authorities in Hamas-run Gaza, with many extra feared useless within the rubble, and pushed almost all its 2.3 million folks from their houses. Qatari and Egyptian mediators have been attempting to dealer a deal that would come with a pause within the combating and the discharge of extra hostages.
Itay was separated from his pal, solely to search out out later he had been included within the listing of hostages to be freed.
“If I had identified I used to be going dwelling, I can inform you that in all probability I would not agree to depart with out Omer,” he stated.
Their story will not be over but, he added. “Regardless that Maya and I are dwelling, Omer continues to be there.”
(Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch; Modifying by Andrew Heavens)