‘Live hunger experiments’: Thousands rally for hostage deal after haunting videos of captives

Some 10,000 people on Saturday evening rallied at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv to demand the release of the captives, after terror groups in Gaza published footage showing hostages Evyatar David and Rom Braslavski severely emaciated and David being forced to dig what he said he fears will be his own grave in a Gaza tunnel.

Thousands more demonstrated a block away outside the Begin Road entrance to the IDF’s headquarters, and in other rallies across the country, marking some of the highest turnouts at the demonstrations in recent weeks.

Speaking in English at Hostages Square, David’s older brother, Ilay, said Hamas was using the captives as “live hunger experiments,” and demanded that Evyatar and the other hostages receive humanitarian aid entering the Gaza Strip to alleviate the humanitarian crisis there.

“I stand before you today as a brother and a son,” said Ilay, hours after the David family approved for publication the Hamas video that showed Evyatar digging what he says he fears is his own grave in an underground tunnel. “A brother and a son whose heart is being torn apart, watching helplessly, as my younger brother, Evyatar David, and his fellow hostage Guy Gilboa-Dalal slip away. They are on the absolute brink of death.”

“In their current unimaginable condition, they may have only days left to live,” said Ilay.

“Hamas is using Evyatar in one of the most horrific and calculated campaigns imaginable,” he continued. “They are starving him deliberately, systematically using his agonizing suffering as a twisted tool for their depraved propaganda.”

“This is not just a violation of international law — it is an assault on every shred of basic human decency,” said Ilay. “An act so vile it scars the very soul of humanity.”

He urged Israel’s government and world leaders, especially US President Donald Trump, to bring about the hostages’ release “by any means necessary.”

“To remain silent now is to be complicit in their slow agonizing death,” he said.

Yeela, Evyatar’s younger sister, addressed her brother in Hebrew: “Mom is shattered and not functioning, Dad hears your voice at night and doesn’t close his eyes, but Ilay and I are taking care of them.”

“We are so waiting for your return and to recover together with you,” she said.

Former hostage Omer Wenkert, who was held for some 250 days with David and Gilboa-Dalal, said he was taken aback at media descriptions of the footage of David as a “sign of life.”

“Really? How dare we call this thing a sign of life?” said Wenkert, adding that he “broke down crying” upon seeing the video.

“If there are hostages in Gaza I can just never get out of there,” he said. “I’m captive in my own land.”

Braslavski’s father, Ofer, accused the government of abandoning his son, saying he didn’t recognize him in the footage released by Palestinian Islamic Jihad on Thursday.

“Rom is a hero, and our country has abandoned him for 666 days now. Two days ago, we all saw the price of abandonment,” he said, referring to the video. “I saw my son and didn’t recognize him. My Rom is hungry for bread, thirsty for water, physically broken and mentally shattered. My child is dying.”

He demanded that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seek a comprehensive deal to end the war and release all the hostages.

“Enough! The partial deal strategy has failed,” he said, referring to the temporary truce agreements in which some captives have been freed. “While you and your government have procrastinated, my son and the rest of the hostages are paying the price.”

After the Hostages Square rally, hostage families and their supporters recited traditional Jewish songs of mourning and read the biblical Scroll of Lamentations, in accordance with the customs of the day-long Tisha B’Av beginning Saturday evening to commemorate the destruction of the two ancient Jewish temples. A regular anti-government protest at Hostages Square was canceled due to the fast.

‘Stop everything’

Earlier Saturday, US special envoy Steve Witkoff visited hostage families at the square and told them that Washington has despaired of partial hostage deals and is now seeking a comprehensive agreement to end the war and release all the hostages.

Hostage families have long assailed Netanyahu for failing to pursue such a deal, though a senior Israeli official told reporters on Thursday that “there will be no more partial hostage deals.”

Speaking at the Begin Road protest Saturday night, Yehuda Cohen, father of captive soldier Nimrod Cohen, said Israel’s apparent about-face was the result of growing European pressure on Netanyahu, including a wave of countries announcing they would recognize a Palestinian state.

“Only pressure on Netanyahu, from inside and outside, will bring us to the end [of the war] and the release of all [the hostages],” said Cohen. “They’re dying of abuse and starvation. Every possible pressure must be exerted on Netanyahu to end the war and bring about a deal.”

Negotiations for a ceasefire-hostage deal have all but stalled for over a week after Israel and the US withdrew their negotiators from Doha.

Speaking at a Hostages and Missing Families Forum rally at the Shaar HaNegev Junction in the south, Gadi Mozes, who was released in February as part of the last ceasefire-hostage deal, slammed the government over the stalled negotiations and what he called “ego struggles and petty politics.”

He called on the public to “stop everything, reject this life being normalized, reject the loss of values and reject the war.”

Terror groups in the Gaza Strip are holding 50 hostages, including 49 of the 251 abducted by Hamas-led terrorists on October 7, 2023. They include the bodies of at least 28 confirmed dead by the IDF. Twenty are believed to be alive and there are grave concerns for the well-being of two others, Israeli officials have said.

Hamas is also holding the body of an IDF soldier killed in Gaza in 2014. Hamas released 30 hostages — 20 Israeli civilians, five soldiers, and five Thai nationals — and the bodies of eight slain Israeli captives during a ceasefire between January and March, and one additional hostage, a dual American-Israeli citizen, in May as a “gesture” to the United States.

The terror group freed 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November 2023, and four hostages were released before that in the early weeks of the war. In exchange, Israel has freed some 2,000 jailed Palestinian terrorists, security prisoners, and Gazan terror suspects detained during the war. Eight hostages have been rescued from captivity by troops alive, and the bodies of 49 have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the Israeli military as they tried to escape their captors, and the body of a soldier who was killed in 2014.