By Bassem Eid, JNS
The hostages are returning from the depths of Gaza, but “safe and sound,” in this case, is a relative term.
The ceasefire agreement between Israel and the Hamas terror group went into effect on Jan. 19 and included the release of some of the surviving hostages kidnapped by the terrorist group on Oct. 7, 2023. Three of these victims—Emily Damari, Romi Gonen and Doron Steinbrecher—were returned to Israel alive in the first week of the deal. It is to be devoutly hoped that as many as possible will shortly be returned safe and sound to their surviving family members.
“Safe and sound,” in this case, is a relative term.
We know for a fact that many, if not all, of the hostages have undergone ongoing abuse of nearly every conceivable kind at the hands of their holders: sexual, physical, emotional and psychological. We have to understand that they are not coming back as the people they once were and that the harm they have suffered will haunt them for the rest of their lives. Similarly, the damage that Hamas has deliberately inflicted on both Israeli and Palestinian societies, as well as the broader region, is deep and lasting.
Let’s not forget how the hostages were kidnapped in the first place. On Oct. 7, 2023, thousands of Hamas operatives and other Palestinians invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, massacring more than 1,200 people in a single day, the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust. Some 364 of the slaughtered were young people dancing at the Nova music festival, which Hamas surrounded and infiltrated.
Many of the victims—in particular, the women and girls—were “murdered twice,” being subjected to brutal rape and genital mutilation before they were slaughtered. Ultimately, Hamas dragged more than 250 living captives back into Gaza, including 12 Americans. In some cases, Hamas terrorists gained access to their victim’s social-media accounts and live-streamed their acts of brutality. Many of the surviving captives lost family members and friends in the most violent possible way during the Oct. 7 attack, and many still may not know which of their loved ones are living or dead.
Horrifically, the abuse perpetrated on the hostages did not end with a single day of horrors. It has now been continuing for a soul-crushing 16 months. Surviving hostages who have been returned in earlier ceasefires have testified about being raped in captivity. Teen hostages were forced to perform sexual acts on each other. Terrorists also whipped the genitalia of minors. The United Nations has described the evidence of rape and torture of hostages in Gaza as “convincing” and have found “reasonable grounds” to suspect that these abuses are ongoing.
Not all of the abuse has been sexual. Hostages were kept in tiny cages in complete darkness underground. Child hostages were deliberately branded with a heated object. Some of the hostages were operated on by veterinarians. They were also psychologically tortured with claims that Israel had already been destroyed and that no one was coming to save them.
Why would anyone, even terrorist operatives, behave with such abject cruelty toward their fellow human beings? To understand this, one must understand Hamas’s ideology of hate. Its founding charter commits to the annihilation of the State of Israel and for it to be replaced with an Islamic theocracy under Sharia law. These are not just words on a page. Hamas-controlled Gaza has a deeply antisemitic media and education environment, in which even children’s programming and school textbooks are full of misinformation about the alleged perfidy of Jews and calls for their annihilation.
It’s not only the traumatized hostages and the Hamas-ruled Gazans who have been irreversibly damaged by the terrorist group’s reign of terror. The day after Oct. 7, Israel was attacked by the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah as a Hamas ally, inaugurating a brutal war in Israel’s north that displaced tens of thousands in both countries. Attacks on Israel continue from other terrorist factions armed by Hamas’s sponsor, Iran, notably the Houthis, who have led an assault on global shipping through the Red Sea. (The Houthi flag bears the unsubtle slogan “Death to the USA, Death to Israel, Curse the Jews, Victory to Islam.”) The ferocious war on Israel has also launched a global surge in antisemitism, with nearly half of adults worldwide now reporting antisemitic views. These trends have derailed efforts toward peace, including the near-signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Saudi Arabia.
All of this is to say that even if all of the hostages were to return home tomorrow, nothing would go back to the way it was. Rape is often a trauma with lifelong impacts; just consider the effects of nearly a year and a half of captivity and unrelenting abuse. Nor will the Gazan population, which has been under Hamas rule since 2007, quickly unlearn the lessons of control by a brutal genocidal regime that uses hospitals, schools, mosques and churches as military sites. Beginning to undo the damage requires one clear and straightforward prerequisite: Like the Nazis before them, there is no just compromise with Hamas that leaves them in power.
They must be unseated, everywhere they hold sway, for the monstrous scars they left behind even to begin to heal.
