From the Liveblog of
Saturday, November 30, 2024
Released captive Emily Hand, father address rally marking hostage deal anniversary
Some 2,000 people attend the Hostages Families Forum central weekly rally at Tel Aviv’s Hostages Square, marking a year since the hostage deal last November, which negotiators have failed to replicate despite intensive efforts.
The rally features speeches from several people freed in last November’s deal, as well as Thomas Hand, father of 9-year-old Emily, who was kidnapped from Kibbutz Be’eri and released on the second day of the week-long deal deal.
Hand, who is Irish, speaks in English.
“I am extremely lucky to have got my little Emily back in one piece,” he says to applause. “I cannot imagine how terrified she must have been.”
“When being taken from Be’eri, Emily saw dead people — people she knew and recognized, lying on the road,” he continues. “It was so bad she thought that everyone she knew — including me — were killed or being killed.”
Hand says his daughter told him the water she was given in captivity was putrid; that the hostages were forced to use the bathroom with the door open while a male terrorist watched them; and that “they were told to repeat words in Arabic, and at the end, they were told: ‘you’re Muslim now.'”
He urges Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach a hostage deal.
“Make a deal, Bibi,” he says, using the premier’s nickname. “You have had more than enough time to get the job done.”
His speech is followed by brief comments in Hebrew by Emily herself.
“I know what it’s like to be there so I don’t want to imagine what it’s like for those who are there now,” she says.
The captivity survivor says she was held along with slain hostage Itai Svirsky and with Noa Argamani, who was rescued in June by security forces.
“Noa came back, but Itai won’t,” she says. “We have to bring the hostages back before it’s too late.” In English, she shouts: “Bring them home now!”
A block away, hundreds of anti-government activists protest in front of the Begin Street entrance to the IDF Headquarters.
At the entrance to the rally, a group urging “nonviolent civilian rebellion” holds an informational session about disobedience tactics and advice on what to do in case of arrest.
A seasoned activist, surrounded by some two dozen neophytes, advises against relying on their right to remain silent if they are detained: “If you use your right to remain silent, your condition in court ends up being worse,” he says.
The “civil rebellion” group is set to march to Dizengoff Square in central Tel Aviv, alongside several prominent anti-government activists, including Labor MKs Gilad Kariv, Efrat Rayten and Naama Lazimi, Democrats chairman Yair Golan, and Noam Dan, cousin of hostage Ofer Kalderon.
