Former hostage tells US lawmakers: Women I was held with were ‘touched’ by Hamas captors

Former hostage Aviva Seigel tells the US House Foreign Affairs Committee that she saw girls held with her after they were “touched” by their Hamas captors, in an emotional testimony in which she details the difficult conditions under which she was held for 51 days.

“I was starved while they ate in front of me,” she recalls, adding that she was constantly thirsty because the hostages were given little water.

Seigel — whose husband, American-Israeli hostage Keith Seigel, is still being held in Gaza — says she and other hostages weren’t allowed to sit or stand and that their only human right while in captivity was deciding whether they’d lie on their back or on their side.

There was little oxygen and it was difficult to breathe, she says, highlighting the plight of those who have been in captivity underground for a period eight months longer than her. Seigel was released as part of the last hostage deal between Israel and Hamas in late November.

She recalls looking at her husband as they lay together in an underground tunnel, struggling to breathe, and praying to herself that she would die first so that she wouldn’t have to see him dead.

Seigel says she and those she was kept with were beaten and tortured.

“I saw the girls coming back after they were touched. I saw the girls coming back after they were forced to take a shower with the door open, when it was the first time that anybody saw their body,” Seigel says.

They weren’t allowed to hug each other or cry.

“Now, I’m here, thinking about Keith and the girls, and it’s too much for me to handle because I know where they are and who they’re with,” she says.

She calls on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept the hostage deal on the table. It’s possible to end the war today, but if the sides wait, it could spiral out of control and it will then no longer be possible to save the hostages, Seigel warns.

Turning to the US lawmakers, Seigel says: “I’m asking you all, please help us. I’m begging. We need them back as soon as possible. I do not want Keith dead.”