JERUSALEM — Hostages kidnapped by the terrorist group Hamas on October 7 in Israel and taken to Gaza They were drugged to keep them docile and suffered psychological and sexual abuse in captivity, an Israeli specialist said Monday.
“I have never seen anything like this” in 20 years treating trauma victims, said Renana Eitan, director of the psychiatric service at Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center (Ichilov). “The physical, sexual, mental and psychological abuse of the returned hostages is terrible,” she added.
The center received 14 hostages released by Hamas. Some reported being drugged, including with what doctors believe were benzodiazepines, psychotropic medications with sedative effects.
“They wanted to control the children. (…) They know that if they drug them they will be silent,” he explained. “One of the girls was administered ketamine for a few weeks,” a powerful dissociative anesthetic known to cause a feeling of disconnection from the environment.
Other former hostages claimed to have been psychologically tormented by their captors, Eitan said. One was told that his wife was dead, when in fact she was still alive in Israel.
Children were separated from their families and forced to watch “brutal videos”, and another patient said she and others were in total darkness for more than four days. “They became psychotic, they had hallucinations,” Eitan said.
Some of those who returned have since reported having suicidal thoughts, he said.
dissociative states
Some 1,200 people were killed in the bloody Hamas attack on October 7, and another 240 were kidnapped, Israeli authorities reported.
A week-long truce agreement, which ended on December 1, allowed the release of 105 hostages in Gaza, including 80 Israelis — mostly women and minors — in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
137 hostages are believed to be still being held by Hamas.
In response, Israel launched an air and ground offensive to “annihilate” Hamas, leaving more than 18,200 dead in the Gaza Strip, according to Hamas’ Health Ministry.
Some freed hostages continue to experience dissociative states, Eitan said. “Sometimes they know they are in the Ichilov medical center, and suddenly they think they are back with Hamas.”
Consequences
The director stated that the consequences for mental health are alarming. About 5% of the Israeli population – some 400,000 people – are expected to suffer from some symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Tomer Zadik, 24, has been receiving treatment at Ichilov since he was shot in the arm at the Supernova music festival, where he describes spending hours hiding while listening to the voices of Hamas terrorists.
“The atrocities cannot be described in words,” said Zadik, who still has nightmares about the attack.
“They wanted to mentally break the entire nation of Israel,” he declared. “But we will not break.”
Source: With information from AFP
