Emily Hand: Irish-Israeli former Hamas hostage, 9, ‘threatened with knife’ throughout ordeal

The father of nine-year-old Emily Hand, the Irish-Israeli lady held hostage by Hamas for 50 days, mentioned she was threatened with a knife throughout her ordeal.

Emily, who was launched in November after her seize on 7 October, suffers from panic assaults and infrequently speaks in whispers, her father mentioned in an interview with Israeli station Channel 12.

Thomas Hand, who’s initially from Dublin, mentioned Emily talks “very little” about her time in captivity.

“Just every now and then, [she gives] little snippets of information. But we’re not actually even allowed to question her in any way, from the psychiatrists’ point of view. They said, ‘No, whatever she wants to say voluntarily, let it come out’.

“She instructed me that they have been threatened with a knife to be quiet.

“That’s an awful vision in your head as a parent, that she lived through that terror.”

But Mr Hand desires to return to their residence in Be’eri, the place the Hamas assault happened on 7 October.

“We all want to go back home. The houses are wrecked, destroyed. The blood of our friends on the roads, in the paths, in the grass, in the earth itself. But yeah, we still want to go back. We have to go back. If we don’t go back, they’ve won.”

But Emily is much less eager, saying: “On the one hand, it’s really, really close to the box” – the time period the nine-year-old makes use of to confer with Gaza.

“On the other hand, all the friends are there. So I don’t know,” she mentioned.

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Mr Hand mentioned his dream for Emily is that she “completely recovers”.

“No more panic attacks. No more whispering. To feel secure – mentally, emotionally. I hope she has a healthy, happy, normal life like any parent wants for their kids,” he mentioned.

But he has referred to as for a “reasonable” deal to be made with Hamas to safe the discharge of the opposite hostages.

“If you ask me as a parent, as a friend of people who are captured, you have to say, do the deal. Give them whatever they want to get everyone back.

“If you ask me as somebody in energy making that deal, you need to make an affordable deal. You cannot go in letting them suppose that they’ll ask for something.

“You get the reports out of what the hostages do go through, and that just increases your pain, your nightmare. I was very lucky that I got my little girl back. You have to hope and pray for every other hostage still held there.”

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The day after the interview, the household was set to have fun the birthday of Mr Hand’s first spouse Narkis who was shot lifeless by Hamas in Be’eri on 7 October.

Narkis was the mom of Mr Hand’s two grownup youngsters and in addition helped to lift Emily after her mom died of most cancers when she was a toddler.

“She would have been 55. She’s not even buried in a permanent place yet.

“Narkis was really her second mom. And Emily beloved Narkis like a mom. So it is going to be a tricky day tomorrow however we’ve got to honour her.”