Hisham al-Sayed’s father: ‘He’s broken, in a state of mental torture. He may have been held alone. He does not speak’

The father of Hisham al-Sayed, who was released by Hamas yesterday after nearly a decade in captivity, says his son is in a very bad state and it appears he is not used to contact with other human beings.

“Hisham feels very bad. He is broken and may have been held alone. It is strange for him to see people,” Sha’ban al-Sayed tells Walla. “He does not speak. He has no voice, he was in a very difficult place and his situation is very difficult.”

“He is not well, he was not in our world. A kind of Tarzan after living for 10 years with animals. He does not communicate,” he tells Channel 12 news.

“Hamas are liars, they are not as respectful as they claimed when they released him without ceremony. They didn’t want people to see what state he was in, and that’s why there was no ceremony. If they had any respect for people, they would have released him a long time ago. What respect?” he says.

Hamas did not stage a propaganda ceremony for al-Sayed’s release. It claimed the move was “out of respect for the Arabs of Israel,” despite having held him for nearly a decade, as well as murdering and abducting several Arab Israelis during the October 7, 2023, onslaught.

“Before [captivity] he would talk, he would write,” Sha’ban al-Sayed tells Channel 12. “He made wrong decisions, but he would communicate. Now we have a person who has disappeared. He tries to talk and to share, but he doesn’t succeed. He says a lot of incomprehensible things. He speaks in a whisper, maybe out of fear. I believe he is in a state of mental torture.”

Hisham al-Sayed, a Bedouin Israeli, entered the Strip near the Erez Crossing in April 2015 when he was 28 years old. According to Human Rights Watch, in the years prior to his entering Gaza, al-Sayed was “diagnosed with schizophrenia and a personality disorder, among other conditions” and was repeatedly institutionalized.