Israeli authorities are preparing to welcome home dozens of hostages who have been held incommunicado by Hamas for more than a year in Gaza, not knowing whether they will return hungry, traumatized or dead.
The release of 33 hostages is expected in the first phase of the cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Some families have glimpsed their loved ones in videos of hostages run by Hamas. But it is not clear in what condition the captives will return.
In Israeli hospitals, health workers are preparing isolated areas where hostages can begin to recover in privacy. Israel's Ministry of Health has developed a comprehensive protocol for their psychological and physical treatment. There are particular concerns that they are severely malnourished.
Hajar Mizrahi, a senior official at Israel's health ministry, said of the hostages released during the 2023 ceasefire: “Those released at the time were already malnourished.” “Now imagine their situation after another 400 days. We are extremely worried about this.”
After Hamas led an attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, killing nearly 1,200 people and capturing nearly 250, a week-long ceasefire in November of that year freed approximately 105 Israeli and foreign hostages. Several people were later released by Israeli military operations, and Israeli soldiers recovered the bodies of dozens of others.
However, about 98 hostages remained in Gaza, dozens of whom were killed by the Israeli authorities.
Many of the women, elderly men and other hostages returned under the first phase of this ceasefire deal are believed to be held by the militant group in a pit of tunnels that can leave physical and psychological scars in Gaza.
Dr. Mizrahi said health officials have reviewed all intelligence, including videos of the hostages, to determine the condition of the hostages. A committee of officials, including Dr. Mizrahi, determined that some of them were killed.
Israeli officials say the logistics of the release will be similar to the previous ceasefire, when 105 hostages were released in exchange for 240 Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
In that exchange, Hamas fighters handed over the hostages – mostly women and children – to the International Committee of the Red Cross. Red Cross workers took the captives to Egypt in a marked ambulance from Gaza before taking them to Israel.
Israeli scouts checked their identity at the border crossing. Around the same time, Israeli security officials released a group of Palestinian female and teenage prisoners.
According to an Israeli military official, this time the Israeli authorities have set up three reception points along the Gaza border to receive hostages. They will be Israeli soldiers, as well as doctors and psychologists, said the official, who did not want to be named in accordance with protocol.
The official said that from there the hostages will be taken to Israeli hospitals where they will be treated.
The 105 hostages released in November 2023 returned to their homeland after being held captive in Gaza for about 50 days. They came to a country that had changed radically; Some only later learned of friends and loved ones killed in the Hamas-led attack.
At first, officials aimed to integrate the returning hostages as quickly as possible, Dr. Mizrahi said. Health authorities now recommend that released hostages stay in the hospital for at least four days, if not longer, he said.
Meanwhile, family members of the hostages – some of whom survived captivity themselves – can only wait.
“Last time we saw the Red Cross moving the hostages, and some of them ran to their relatives and hugged them,” said Einat Yehene, a clinical psychologist who works with the Forum of Hostage Families, an advocacy group. “Given the physical and emotional conditions we expect, this time will not be easy or the same.”