The trauma of 9 year old Emily, who was released from Hamas captivity

that's better thas em yeah going good everything's uh sorting itself out slowly still uh very difficult though she's pretty good very very good making progress recovering um but yeah the rest of us the rest of us are broken now could you ever imagine that we would be sitting here talking Emily beside you smiling no no you know at some point it was um she was gone completely so at that point there was no no future with us and when did you came back uh yeah a miracle absolute Miracle but uh it it did come with a a lot of guilt for the rest of them um it's just something you have to get on with um but yeah you hope you pray the they'll come out as well so if now the families of the hostages that are still there are watching you what do you have to tell them to say to them stay strong stay uh stay positive I know it's very very hard but uh this is proof that it's possible it can come back you know I'd given all I'd given up all hope really and uh it can happen it can happen no I'm good so far I'm good so far of um why did it take so long for you to come yeah uh well thankfully uh that question in my head or that doubt that guilt that in my head was uh quashed within a second of meeting her because um she kept looking at me and uh eventually I said what's the matter and she said I thought you were dead I thought you were kidnapped one or the other that's what she saw on her way out of the kots she saw people who she knew killed on the ground murdered and she saw other members of the kibuts being taken away so obviously not obviously to me at the time that's the conclusion she came to but I thought that yeah she was down deep in the dark tunnels going where is my dad where is he but uh she presumed I was killed or captive so that was a great relief and throughout all these weeks all these days when when you when you talk about it does she still have questions that you don't know how to answer about that time to be honest no um she doesn't say a lot about it really um she actually has code words for Gaza terrorists she has lots and lots of code words it's it's uh what's uh what's Zim any food or item that she doesn't like she transfers that word that's her code why do you have codes yeah she doesn't even want to say it as soon as she came out she was still in the pajamas that she wore when she went out two months they gave her a pair of trouts and a another top to put on top and uh as soon as we got to the hospital she ripped it off and went straight to the bin just threw them in the bin she didn't want anything anything from them she was with men all the time is the mainly three [Music] [Music] guys Emily has healed extremely fast like I say resilience of children um for the rest of us it's much slower um I'm okay because I've got a purpose by giving interviews by going traveling to America or whatever that gives me something to focus on uh Natalie and Aiden my two older kids they've lost their mother um NIS nus yeah shot shot on that day and so they're still grieving for her and coping with all this that's going on how do you think she has changed in a matter that she won't be the same again she was immediately a bit more mature that's for sure and uh I've heard that from a lot of other parents the was a quite a shift in maturity um she has she's insecure uh she's having a shower I have to sit outside um she wouldn't have a shower in a little confined room with me somewhere else in the house I've I've got to be there um yeah she always wants to know that the door is locked that the shutters are down she wants to be secure feel secure in her in her environment in the house my biggest worry no matter how well she seems to be doing and really is doing my biggest worry is that something along the line triggers her and something pops up and that could be anything anywhere um so yeah we pray that that doesn't happen and that she just recovers fully and continues with the rest of her life and the nights every night I'd ask her you know did you dream sorry the next morning I'd ask her if she dreams and she usually would say no all good um she had one good recurring dream where she escaped from Hamas and ran back to Barry uh that happened quite a few nights but uh yeah normally I at the beginning I was watching her in her asleep and uh if she sort of started crunching her face I knew she was was having a bad dream i' just break her out a bit she sleeps alone no she sleeps either in my room or in my bed I can't even I can't even go upstairs without her following me she doesn't let you yes uh yeah she's still afraid that'll take that'll take long long time to get over she's talking about the people that she left there yeah when when I got the news that uh Yosi shabi was killed and itki um thankfully she knows that the Hamas lie and lie and lie and so she even though she heard it officially unofficially she said I don't believe it they they lie they lie so I've left her with that thought but uh you know how kids are with all their whatsapps I'm sure she's realized that they are gone wow yeah she knew she had her birthday apparently yes because like I say I believed she was down in the tunnels cuz that's the safest place that's where I thought they would treasure their hostages but no she from the time she was kidnapped they ran to one house I don't know if it was a complete house or a bummed up house but some kind of shelter next morning they ran to another house next morning they ran to another house presumably keeping one step ahead of the IDF they only had um for entertainment or pass the time clim or drawing two months of that in a very tight confined space is eventually going to wear off so yeah I'm sure they messed around in their head yeah but very quiet ly uh H be quiet or I'll kill you with this knife to a eight-year-old child as she was then barbarians did you tell you who was the person that took care of her all the this time in captivity uh Rya uh the mother of her friend Rya totally looked after him like her own child made sure that they both had food she bathed her you know just in a a bowl a basin of warmish water and a rag uh R cut her hair basically to make it more manageable they met Emily and R yeah of course yeah they met and they talked yeah as soon as we could yeah they they all had fun he learned uh Emily went off to the side away from the grown-ups uh yeah laugh giggled probably had memories and Recollections talking about it all but uh smiling happy [Music] for thinking you know always about the the families that that can't that can't have this happy moment yet M and um I want to ask you if you have any insights about what they should do to prepare to the case when their loved ones will come back home uh a very important thing was that I brought our dog that was crucial because like I say in my head I thought she would have some resentment towards me you know not protecting her for all that time um so the dog was blameless guilt without guilt he's just pure pure love so uh even if she might have gone a little bit of a cold shoulder to me she had she had Jonie the dog so you're saying get a dog saying if you have any pets even a parrot I don't know bring it along to the hospital when the when they get changed over it's quite crucial try and think whatever favorite food they want favorite toy anything just to immediately reconnect them with home cuz it's been a long time um um they're going to be starving she was say ravenous like a horse but cuz her stomach had shrunk so much we had to be careful she wanted to eat like a mountain of food we had to like no no no little bit ligher little bit later till now she's good now she can eat like a horse you feel strong enough after what you've been gone through after what Emily has been going going through yeah uh mentally and physically it it really takes a lot out of you um uh when it all started I was like 65 kog by the time they released Emily I was 52 that was a massive weight loss yeah um I've recovered got me little belly back uh took a lot of hard work there you go a lot of chocolate which I don't have a sweet tooth but my body's said eat chocolate get the calories inside um few beers uh but that doesn't put on weight and loads of meals some say that the price that Israel needs to pay for releasing the hostages MH has a high cost uh yeah the Hamas are going to want as much as they can for every single hostage that they've got um we'll give them prisoners back and a lot in a lot of times in the papers it says a you know a hostage deal it's not a hostage deal it's a it's a swap of hostages for convicted prisoners murderers yeah some cases yeah some of them very cruel very cruel and like we let we uh we already let one very important guy go and he's he's now the leader of them yeah so that's that's a very very big risk but um that's why we have to completely destroy Hamas from the top some say can't really do that yeah um we can make it extremely weak and uh simply not allow them back into Gaza ever but I'm just trying to understand so what you're saying is that Israel should release no matter what's the amount of the Prisoners the murderers that she has in order to get everyone back Reon within reason of course yeah what is within reason they couldn't turn around and say we want every single Palestinian prisoner in jail well they can they can say it but they're not going to get it um you know talk reasonable numbers so how comfortable you feel talking to me about you know the numbers and about what is should do when your daughter who was in captivity for so long is sitting next to you and she's fine and she's healthy and she's okay MH believe it or not in my head at the time when she was uh captive I knew that the IDF had to do everything in its powers to destroy Hamas primarily and to do whatever they could to find and uh retrieve the hostages and and uh within that thought process I realized that she could be bombed could be shot by Friendly Fire um that was a price that in my head I could say yeah okay so long so long as we destroy Hamas so long as the government and the military finished the job they've started out to do if not everyone who's died hostages all the massacres all the terrible things that happened is pointless pointless a waste of time effort and lives we have to finish the job completely and I I really don't care what the world says I really don't care doesn't matter what I say they'll think whatever they want but now we have to finish it they started it and we will finish it Thomas thank you very much for taking the time to talk to us you're welcome thanks thanks a lot

Channel: כאן | חדשות - תאגיד השידור הישראלי

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Keywords: כאן, כאן | חדשות תאגיד השידור הישראלי, כאן חדשות טלוויזיה, חדשות כאן, שידורים, חדשות תאגיד השידור כאן, כאן חדשות, hadashot 11

Id: PYIgV03_1uY

Length: 17min 54sec (1074 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 25 2024