‘Blood will be on your hands’: Former hostage urges MKs to end war, return captives
In Knesset, Arbel Yehoud says she was tortured in response to IDF operations; demands government make deal; urges general strike until partner Ariel Cunio, all 58 hostages returned
Former hostage Arbel Yehoud, addressing lawmakers in the Knesset on Monday, said that she was tortured in captivity and starved in response to Israeli military action in Gaza, as she denounced the government’s renewed military offensive and demanded that Israelis take to the streets until the 58 remaining hostages are returned.
“You should know that when relatives of my captors were injured by IDF actions, I was badly beaten and thrown into solitary confinement for long days without food fit for human consumption and hygiene conditions comparable to concentration camps during the Holocaust,” she said during a joint session of the Knesset’s Constitution, Law and Justice Committee and National Security Committee on Monday.
Yehoud recounted the terror she experienced during IDF airstrikes, recalling the rescue of hostages Louis Har and Fernando Marman from Rafah in an IDF operation on February 12, 2024. On the night of the rescue operation, she said, she “chose to say goodbye to [her] family,” as she believed it would be her last.
According to previous testimony from Yehoud and other released hostages, their captors threatened to shoot them if they thought Israeli forces were approaching.
Yehoud, 29, was held for 482 days in captivity by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group and freed during a ceasefire deal along with Gadi Mozes, 80, in Khan Younis on January 30.
The deal saw Hamas release 33 women, children, civilian men over 50 and others deemed “humanitarian cases,” in exchange for some 1,900 Palestinian prisoners, including over 270 serving life terms over the murders of dozens of Israelis.
Yehoud told the committee that she survived because of her hope to return to her family, especially to the children of her brother Dolev, who was killed on Nir Oz on October 7. She learned of his death while in captivity.
“Even in moments of despair, when I was humiliated and suffered from psychological terror and attempts to break my spirit, I did not break,” she said with emotion
Then she castigated the government for abandoning the remaining hostages.
“Does it make sense to you that I’m the one who needs to be here to shout for the freedom of my beloved Ariel, his brother David, and the rest of the hostages?” Yehoud asked the committee members.
Yehoud’s partner, Ariel Cunio, remains captive along with his brother David. David’s wife Sharon and 3-year-old twins, Yuli and Emma, were also taken hostage from Nir Oz on October 7 and freed during a previous ceasefire in November 2023.
“When I was there, I thought that my family and the Israeli government would work for my release as their one and only supreme goal,” she said. “I was right about my family, but not about the government, which still chooses today — 591 days after the war began — to continue a military path that endangers the lives of the hostages.”
The IDF announced late Friday that it was launching the first stages of a major offensive in the Gaza Strip, dubbed “Gideon’s Chariots,” aimed at seizing “strategic areas” of the Strip. Hamas-run authorities have since reported dozens killed in heavy Israeli airstrikes.
At the same time, Israel and Hamas were engaged in renewed talks in Qatar to reach a ceasefire and hostage release deal for the 58 remaining captives in Gaza.
Yehoud urged lawmakers to end the war and agree to a deal.
“I demand that you, ministers of the government and members of Knesset, act to stop the fighting and bring [the hostages] back to us,” she said. “As someone who was there, I know negotiations are the only way.”
She added that her recovery — and that of other released hostages — could not begin until the remaining captives were brought home. “Physically, we are here, but mentally we are still in captivity,” she said.
“Look at me and see who you are abandoning and who you have chosen to sacrifice as a solution to the Gaza problem. There are 58 other Israeli citizens like me who aren’t just suffering but are also dying,” Yehoud implored. “Your hands will be covered in their blood and the blood of soldiers if you do not stop this war.”
She also called on the public to act: “To you, citizens of the nation: I call on each and every one of you to take to the streets and bring life to a halt across the country until all the hostages are returned.”
Yehoud was kidnapped during Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught on Kibbutz Nir Oz, when roughly one in four of the kibbutz’s 400-odd members was kidnapped or murdered/ Across southern Israel, Hamas-led terrorists killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages, sparking the war in Gaza.
Of the 58 hostages held by terror groups in the Gaza Strip, at least 35 have been confirmed dead by the IDF, and 20 are thought to be alive. There are grave concerns for the well-being of three others, Israeli officials have said.
The Times of Israel Community.