Avinatan Or, a 32-year-old electrical engineer, was one of the last 20 living hostages to be released by Hamas this Monday (13), after a ceasefire agreement between the terrorist group and Israel, brokered by the US, was reached last week.
According to information from the Israeli Channel 12, reproduced by the newspaper The Times of Israel, an initial medical examination showed that Or lost between 30% and 40% of his body weight in two years of captivity in the Gaza Strip.
The broadcaster reported that the electrical engineer was held in the central Gaza Strip during most of the war in harsh conditions, including long periods of starvation, and without having contact with other hostages.
After being released, Or shared what they called their “first cigarette together after two years” with his girlfriend, Noa Argamani, another former Hamas hostage, and asked to be alone with her.
According to information from The Jerusalem Post, the couple was kidnapped at the Nova music festival, in the city of Re’im, where Hamas carried out one of the biggest massacres of the October 7, 2023 attacks.
Both spent hours hiding in a ditch, but the terrorists found them. The electrical engineer’s mother, Ditza Or, told the Jewish Chronicle newspaper that Or had the opportunity to flee at the time, but didn’t do so because he didn’t want to leave his girlfriend behind, “in the hands of monsters.”
“I thought about what would have happened if he had escaped, but I know he would never have forgiven himself. He wouldn’t have been able to live with himself. So, he was very loyal, and I’m proud of him for that,” Ditza said.
The second oldest of seven siblings, Or reported, according to Channel 12, that he only found out that his girlfriend had been released before him when he met her again this Monday.
On June 8, 2024, Noa Argamani and three other hostages were rescued in Gaza in a joint operation by the Israel Defense Forces, the Shin Bet (the country’s security agency) and the Israeli police.
Or also reunited with his parents and, in a video published by the Israeli forces, he appears saying to Ditza and his father, Yaron: “How I hoped to have the chance to say that I love you and to see you once again in this life!”
