Inside Hamas’s Psychological Warfare | What It Will Take to Free the Hostages
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I think every citizen here has to know that the Israeli government, the Israeli society will do anything to bring him back to his family, back to his community because that's a core value in the Israeli society. Leave no man behind. That's what we are established on and that will be our legacy as Jewish people, as Israeli people, I think till the end of days.

Hello and welcome to State of a Nation. I'm Elon Levy. Israel and Hamas agree on something. Hamas is evil and we both want the world to know it. Recently, Hamas has been going out of its way to show the world what a twisted and depraved regime it is.

It showed the world how evil it is with the dead baby parades. When they paraded the bodies of Kfir and Ariel Bibas in black coffins as they invited families to celebrate it in Gaza like it's a family fun day. They showed us how evil they are when they released three hostages who had been deliberately starved so they looked like Auschwitz survivors.

And they showed us how evil they are with a recent propaganda video that took unimaginable creativity to produce that cruelty. That propaganda video features the brother of today's guest. Eli David is the brother of Eviatar David. Eviatar was abducted from the Nova Music Festival on October 7th, 2023, together with his best friend, Guy Gilboa Dallal.

They've been trapped in the dungeons of Gaza for over 17 months.

And Eli joins me on the podcast today to talk about the revelations that they have found from other surviving hostages about the conditions inside the dungeons of Gaza, about the family's struggle to keep the hostages' plight at the forefront of international consciousness, and about the conversations that he's been having with Trump administration officials about the need to put pressure on Hamas' state sponsors to force them to release all the hostages now.

It's a gripping episode and one with a call to action on everyone watching this to do whatever you can to fight for the freedom of the hostages rotting in the dungeons of Gaza. Join me for a conversation between the lines and beyond the headlines.

Breaking news out of Israel this morning. Shocking hostage. Hundreds of Israelis are dead. I want to bring in Israeli government spokesman Elon. What happens when a four-day court. Have you resolved this? Where does this go? Eli David, welcome to State of a Nation. Hi, thank you for having me.

The last proof of life that you have of your brother Eviatar in the dungeons of Gaza came from a hostage video released by the Hamas regime in Gaza. And it was an especially cruel video that shocked everyone in Israel. Tell me what was in it. We saw Eviatar and his best friend, Guy. We saw them inside a van. The terrorists took them out of the tunnel.

in order to show them the releasing parade of the hostages. One of them was with them underground, inside the dungeons for eight months. Which hostage? Omer. Omer. Omer Venkert. And they saw him from the van. They were talking about him on the video. And then they begged to the camera for Netanyahu, for the world to save them, to get them out of the hell. And then...

They are being taken to the tunnels again. We've seen some really sick propaganda videos by Hamas. Of course, the dead baby parade when they took out the bodies of Kfir and Ariel Bibas. All the hostage release parades which have been degrading and humiliating. But a video in which they took two hostages, they told them they were going to be released? Yes. And then had them beg for their lives on camera was especially cruel.

Where were you when you received that video? I mean, how do you get a video from Hamas? Do you just see it on the news like everyone else? They emailed me. Just kidding. I mean, I was on the States. You had me for a moment. Because they're cruel enough that they would do that. I was at the States with a guy's older brother, Gal. And we sat...

on Trump's speech and while he was speaking about the hostages... Where was Trump speaking? This was at CIPAC? Yeah, it was at CIPAC. And while he was speaking about the hostages, actually it was amazing, the timing was perfect, my phone explodes from calls and messages and then everybody tells me there's a video and I enter Telegram. They post all of their videos in Telegram.

And we see a veteran guy and me and Gal were sitting right next to each other and we see that muted and we just, you know, we showed the video to everybody around us, people from the White House, that staff. While Trump is speaking. While Trump is speaking. You're passing around your phone to his staffers. Yes. So again, the timing was perfect.

But after that, we saw the video again. I mean, we were so excited to see a sign of life from them. Was this the first proof of life that you received of Eviatar from Gaza? It was the first solid proof of life. On October 7th, they released a hostage video of both of them, Eviatar and Guy, and another video with Eviatar only, when we saw him being dragged shirtless, bounded, inside Gaza.

the Gaza Strip. And then we saw both of them bounded, beaten inside a dark room. They were terrified, looking straight to the camera. It was on October 7th. So we were sure Avatar is alive. We were sure, like we could feel him. I really could feel him in my bones. I could feel when he's cold or when he's hungry. But then we saw that they are together.

I mean, at the last video, we saw them together. We had no idea that they are together. We knew they went together to the Nova Festival, but they were kidnapped together. But we had no idea that they are together all that time. So it was amazing for us because hopefully they kept each other safe.

I mean, they were childhood friends, right? Yes. So to be held together in captivity, at least they're able to talk and keep each other sane throughout the torment. But hang on. You received this video of them begging for their lives at a hostage release parade while you're watching President Trump speaking at CPAC. President Trump's staffers are right next to you. You pass around the phone. I mean, how do they react when they see this? How do they react to this? They were shocked.

They were shocked. I think they are not used to see those kinds of videos. Because it wasn't just another hostage video where they forced them to read a statement in front of the camera. It was like a disgusting level of creativity had gone into coming up with the cruelest video they could come up with. Yes.

Yes, they just asked them to watch. And then they told them, just beg for your life. Tell Netanyahu, tell Israel, tell whoever's listening, save us. And so they improvised. They kind of improvised. They didn't receive any text to read from. And they're bad actors, I must say. Why? You can see their acting. You can see that. I mean, the...

It's authentic because I know my brother and I saw him in that video. I really saw my brother, which I know and love, but I saw in his eyes that he's really begging for his life. I saw a broken man. I saw somebody who's starved and exhausted and humiliated and he wanted to cry so much. I saw that. I know him. He just wanted to cry, but he wouldn't allow himself to cry.

Eli, tell me about your brother, Eviatan. Because it's very easy for people who care about the hostages to see them as a symbol, a cause, a name, a face. But these are real people rotting in hell. Exactly. And that's part of our advocacy, to make them people, to bring it back to who they are. I mean, my brother is a person, not only a poster, not only a number, but

so gladly. Evetar is 24. He marked his second birthday in captivity on December. He was 22 when he was abducted. He went there with his best friend, Guy, Guy Gilboa Dalal, which is on the video with him, on captivity with him. And they are best friends since childhood, since they're one. They have...

Two other very good friends that went with them, a boy and a girl, which became a couple just a week before the festival, and they were killed on the spot. They were murdered. Four of them hid together on the field when they heard the terrorists are coming. And if you're a Terran guy, they had that sensation. They had that...

feeling that it's dangerous to be all of four of them together so they split up and that's that's what saved the veteran guy everybody around them were killed a dying guy and five other uh people men with them on on inside the same bush they were they were um kidnapped saved saved yeah i wanted to say saved and then it was crazy because they are not saved yet um

Evitar is a musician. He's the kindest soul I know. He's my younger brother, so he's also very annoying. But I see how he treats my parents. And he's such a good son for my parents. And they are on his mind all the time. Evitar, he's a listener.

His friends, their joke is that he's their therapist. And every time they have any problem or they need advice, they go to him because he can listen. He's very patient. Actually, I sat with him two years ago, like half a year before he was abducted. And he told me about his dreams. A young man, 22 years old, dreaming about his future. He told me he wants to learn music production.

and take his hobby, he plays the guitar, I want to take his hobby to the next level, to make it professional. And he's always, like he's never, he doesn't like to be at the spotlight. He's always at the, he likes to be backstage. That's, I think, that's why he thinks about music production, not to be at the front. And he's the sweetest boy I know. The thing we love to do the most is playing music together. I play the piano.

Vitar plays the guitar. And every week we play music and sing together at my parents'. So it became a tradition. And I actually tell this story everywhere because that's our connection. That's our bond. That's what brings joy to us as brothers. And I really miss his voice. He has a beautiful voice. I miss his hug. He has the warmth, hug. And the hostages that came back, they told us,

They tried all the time to send messages to the families in case some of them will be killed, God forbid, or in case some of them will be released before the others. What do you mean? The hostages gave each other messages to pass on to their families in case the others were released? Exactly, yes. And did Evita send you a message?

He did. He did send me a message. He sent my sisters, my parents, his friends. Through Omer Venkat? Yes. So most of the messages, it's funny. Most of the messages, I mean, it's not really funny. Most of the messages are about food. They are talking about food all day. They are imagining food.

the minute, the second they will taste something they like. Right. Which hostage was it who came out and wrote on the little whiteboard in the helicopter, I really want a hamburger? Yeah, it was Omer Shemtov, I think. So almost all the messages are about food. And he told me that he misses playing music with me, playing music and sing. And that's amazing because

It's the core. It's the core of it. Vettar is... He tried to drum... He and Guy, they're drumming and singing songs they like, songs they grew up on. They're drumming and singing to try to stay sane in a tunnel under Gaza. Exactly. And music really has a healing power. And that's the only thing that keeps them sane. And every time I try to...

jam a little bit, play a little bit. I try to send him that energy of healing. And hopefully, hopefully, the first thing we'll do when he comes back is play music again. Your brother was held in the tunnels under Gaza together with Omer Venkat, the hostage who was released a few weeks ago. What has Omer told you about the conditions that your brother is held in? Now, when you close your eyes and imagine your brother there inside Gaza...

What conditions is he being held in? I'm Imogen Folks, the host of Inside Geneva, a podcast where we tackle the big questions facing our planet. Can UN investigations bring more criminals to justice? Does the world need a pandemic treaty? What about climate change or refugees? Should we ban autonomous weapons? Some call them killer robots.

Get the answers you need with me and our expert guests twice a month on Inside Geneva, free with your usual podcast app. It's tough. I mean, since I've heard about it, I'm kind of broken. But I have to, you know, keep it up and wake up every morning knowing if Etar is coming back home and that he survives and doing whatever he can. 30 meters underground, 11 meters long terror tunnel.

One meter width. And at the end, a pit that they use as a toilet. Just a pit in the ground, a hole in the ground. A hole inside a hole in the ground. Yes, inside the tunnel. A one meter wide tunnel. It's basically a long coffin. That's what it is, yeah. They can barely stand. I mean, the ceiling scratching their heads. They eat something like...

300 calories a day. I've heard Holocaust survivors that are talking about the same amount of calories. So they are starved. There's a constant illumination on the floor. So they have no day or light. It's fluorescent light. They know when it's morning when the terrorists are praying. They're captors. When they pray, they know. Or when they come, just coming in and waking them up.

They are disconnected from the outside world, so they don't listen to the radio. They don't have any TV, so they have no idea what's going on. Some of the hostages came back and said that they saw bits of Al Jazeera. They listened to the radio. They heard their families speaking about them, and that gave them strength and hope. But Eviatar has no connection with the outside world. Nothing. At the first months, when they were...

above ground they had some connections they saw beats from Al Jazeera but they never saw us and we tried so hard to be visible for them to see and now I know that as much as I tried and my family tried they didn't see us at all and right now for since June since Arnon operation the rescue operation

They haven't seen sunlight. It was the first time they saw sunlight when we saw them at the video since like eight months. Some of the hostages have come back and reported that they were held in shackles and chained underground. Is Aviatar chained? Luckily, they are not chained. They were chained at the two first months of their captivity. They were held by Nuhba fighters, Nuhba terrorists.

Hamas, elite forces. Yeah, and it was super strict. They weren't allowed to talk or they were blindfolded. And now I think that the main advantage of being underground is that the terrorists are calmer because they are not afraid from the IDF bombs.

So when they were above ground, they were so afraid all the time that they will be bombed. They're terrorists as well, the captors. And when the captors are afraid, they are much more violent. That's the grimmest silver lining I have ever heard in my life. Yeah, it's sick. What about torture? Is he being tortured? As we know, yes. I mean, it's a matter of mood. If the captors is angry or scared...

he will abuse them. I mean, he will use violence. Fortunately, most of the time they just need to deal with starvation and depression. So the captors are not looking to abuse them all the time, just when they're angry or upset.

Or when a viatar or guy are doing too much noise. So again, luckily, most of the time they are not abused, but there are those little points when they, as we saw the video, by the way, when the captors are using psychological terror on them,

And that can break people apart. Yeah, you're saying most of the time not abused. Obviously being held in a dark, airless tunnel that stinks is a form of abuse in itself. That's a real abuse. Eli, when you got this video of your brother in the van at the hostage release parade, you were listening to President Trump's speech at CPAC. I was at home. I saw this video. And whenever there is a hostage video, immediately before...

I, as someone with a Twitter account, publicizes it. We always wait for an announcement from the hostage forum because some families don't want the propaganda videos released. Some want them released. Some want only stills. And, you know, like I have an interest, obviously, in telling the whole world about this, about how evil Hamas is. But we also want to respect the family's wishes. So we wait.

And some families don't want the propaganda videos released at all. Your family made a decision pretty much immediately that you wanted the video to be released. Why? It was like there was no discussion. We were immediately publishing that video because, as you said, we wanted the world to see Hamas cruelty. They tried to use that as propaganda against us, but we didn't.

believe that all the world should see that, how they are abusing our people, innocent people who just went to celebrate at a music festival and they are being held for so long underground and they are abused every day, starved, deprived of any basic human need. So we believe all the world should see that video and see how Hamas is cruel

and hopefully we will gain enough pressure to make them, you know, release them as soon as possible. Like you say, your brother's not a soldier. He was abducted from a music festival. It would be like someone in the UK getting abducted from Glastonbury by Al-Qaeda or getting abducted from Coachella by ISIS and waking up and finding yourself in Afghanistan. Did you have thoughts of going to the Nova Festival? Was that something you discussed with your brother?

Actually, never. I didn't know about that festival at all. I knew of Etar, I mean, he's a big festival lover. He goes to a festival or a rave every month. So it was a usual thing. And I mean, even that festival, we knew it's on the Gazan border.

He didn't mind us. I mean, it's inside Israel. It's okay. Yeah, it was meant to be. And that was obviously part of the massive disaster of October 7th. The people who were supposed to be perfectly safe inside Israel's borders...

We were let down. Eli, you just spent a month in the US trying to draw up support for the hostages and their families. You said now that you wanted to release the video, the Hamas psychological terrorism video, because you want to increase pressure on Hamas and show the world its cruelty. What sort of pressure are you trying to drum up against Hamas? What were you asking for in the US? So first of all, I think...

Supporting Israeli efforts to protect its citizens, it's something super important for all the nations to understand because we are fighting an enemy that's spread around the world. It's not only Hamas, it's its accomplices as well.

And I think we need to put as much pressure as we can on the negotiators, on Hamas' sponsors, on Egypt, on Qatar, because they try to benefit from all of that situation when they are actually sponsoring those terrorists some of the time or most of the time. It depends. What do you mean that Qatar and Egypt are trying to benefit from this situation?

Obviously, they are trying to be painted as the saviors of the Palestinians or something like that. And also the Qataris and the Egyptians, they have economical connections with the US and Europe. So they can benefit. If they are peacemakers, it will benefit for them. So...

Because the U.S. is treating them as good faith mediators, but you don't see it that way? I don't see it that way. I think when it will be over, the Qataris should pay. And right now we are counting on them because they really made a very, very long way as negotiators. So we cannot afford to lose that.

But we have to keep pushing them. The U.S. has a big military base based in Qatar, and it's a very strong leverage on them. I mean, the U.S. has very strong leverage on the Qataris, and hopefully Trump knows how to use that leverage. So when you were in the U.S. now, you were demanding...

what, political pressure on Egypt and Qatar to use their leverage against Hamas and not just pretend that they're these go-betweens? Actually, most of the time I demanded that Trump's team will think about a better framework than the framework we were used to work with. I mean, the Biden administration, they had a certain framework which didn't work so well. So I asked them to do what Trump's do

to make a better deal, to secure a safer, bigger, faster deal, something that everybody could benefit more. And hopefully, I mean, I know they are more goal-oriented than framework-oriented. So hopefully they can make something better. I mean, let's just create a little bit of sense for our listeners. The...

Trump administration secured a three-stage ceasefire. Phase one of the ceasefire is over. In phase one of the ceasefire, Israel received 33 hostages back, eight of whom were murdered in captivity and came back as bodies.

Israel agreed to a pause in the fighting, retreated from the urban areas in the middle of Gaza, flooded Gaza with over 4,000 trucks of aid every week. 10,000 of them in total. Over 25,000 trucks of aid have entered Gaza in phase one of the ceasefire, but that is over.

Phase two of the ceasefire is supposed to see Hamas release the remaining living hostages, of whom we think there are around 24, including your brother. Hamas will release the living hostages. Israel will withdraw from the Gaza Strip completely, and the war will end.

The problem that we're in now is that Israel and Hamas have fundamentally different interpretations of what phase two means. We're about to witness what happens when an unstoppable force hits an unmovable object, right? Israel says...

Sure, we'll end the war and we'll withdraw, but Hamas has to step down. It has to relinquish power. We're not going back to the Hamas terror regime controlling Gaza, plotting another October 7th massacre. That's not something we can consider. Hamas says, well, we're using the hostages as insurance to try to force an Israeli withdrawal. And phase two means Israel backs off and Hamas begins reconstruction of the Hamas terror state in Gaza. So where we're at now is,

that the talks have broken down is that the United States has proposed what they're calling the Witkoff framework, which is a bridging step. It says, until we can agree on phase two and a permanent ceasefire, Hamas will release half of the hostages living and dead, and then they'll release the rest when we get to a permanent ceasefire. I wonder, Israel has said, we accept that. Hamas has said, no. What do you think of that proposal?

That's a tough question. I think every proposal that doesn't include all the hostages together at once is not good. So we have to agree about the less worse scenario, I think. The less worse deal. Yeah, there are no good options on the table at the moment. For sure? The situation is terrible, whichever way we look at it. I mean, I can only...

tell you how we as families, how we feel. Every drop of hostages, every small amount of hostages coming out, even a half. I mean, okay, so we release a half and the next time we will release another half of the half and then another half and it will never end. It's better than no one getting out now. That's right. That's right. But still, we as families, it's like...

It's like the Hunger Games. It's much more cool than that because we became a big family on October 7th, us, the hostage families. And it's a torture for all of us to not be able to see the end. And it's like a Russian roulette. I mean, every time a hostage is coming out,

You are not sure about the next one. You can never know when the next one is coming out. And that's a real torture. So you keep on hearing about the starvation, about the inhuman conditions, about the mental illness, and you don't know when it will be over. I mean, you're telling the Trump administration, help us get a better deal. Help us get a deal that gets all the hostages out in one go.

Do you see any world in which the Hamas terror regime agrees to release all the hostages in one go? Like, why would they do that? I think we can agree to a deal where Hamas still stays in control. And that's because...

They are second priority. That's what I think. I think we have to save the ones we can save, which are suffering for so long, for more than 500 days. They are suffocating underground and they can be executed at any moment. So we have a moral obligation to save them right now. And that's first priority. And the second priority is demolishing Hamas. And I think, I mean, we showed, Israel showed how strong it is.

how much force it has, how much, how strong intelligence it has. And I think we have a very long fight with Hamas. It will take more than 10 years to actually destroy Hamas completely because it's, first of all, it's an ideology. I mean, the children can be soldiers. We saw 15, 14 young men

teenagers holding guns and trying to fight the Israeli forces. So we'll have to, we have such a long way to really demolish Hamas and the hostages, they don't have that time. That's a problem. It's a matter of time. And we cannot allow our brothers, our sons to decay underground. It will be a moral stain, a black moral stain.

So we have to save them first. And after that, we can win only after we bring them home. Right. So the argument is pay whatever price you have to pay now, get the hostages out and we'll go back to the war later. Somehow we'll demolish Hamas. It just won't happen tomorrow. It'll be the day after tomorrow.

Again, it's not I think we don't need to give them anything because, again, we are not sure they want to. They need that insurance. And the only insurance they have right now, the only asset they have is our loved ones, the hostages. So they will try and keep the hostages as close as they can.

to them. Right. I mean, I've been arguing, even if we offer the Senua family a villa with a swimming pool on the Temple Mount, they're not going to release everyone because they want them as insurance. And that's part of the pressure that you are calling for from the Trump administration against Hamas and its sponsors. I mean, what?

Did you have specific action items? Like, were you asking for sanctions against Qatar and Egypt to relocate the military base? What specific... I mean, look, you're not an international policymaker, right? You're just a brother who wants to get his brother back from captivity. But what were your specific demands? Again, I try to ask from the policymakers to do...

those decisions because I really have no idea how politics works and how war works and whatever. So I try to make Eviatar and the other hostages as visible as I can and really point the enemy. And then the policymakers, they will understand what to do with it. President Trump has used the phrase a lot that if the hostages are not released...

all hell will break loose, the gates of hell will open. Netanyahu has also said, if all the hostages are not returned, he thumps on the table, it will pay a price that it can't possibly imagine. What do you think about that sort of rhetoric? Is that the right way to go, threatening Hamas that way? It worked. It worked on January. So I think it's a good strategy for now. I mean, they are murderers on the other side. Hamas are murderers. They want to kill Jews as much as they can. And I think...

We have to be aggressive with them. We have to be. If you want as much as hostages as we can get at once, we have to be aggressive. But there's this dilemma, right? On the one hand, you say you have to be aggressive. You have to speak like a mafioso because you're dealing with the jihadi death cult. You can't ask them nicely. You have to bang on the table and threaten them with consequences. But if the consequence, the gates of hell are going to open, means Israel is going to return to the war with full force...

Like, what does that mean for the hostages? Can we afford to open the gates of hell because your brother is still stuck there in hell? That's right. It's a very good question. I have no good answer for that. Hopefully, the main goal is to bring back the hostages. I think the Israeli government knows that and believes so. I think also the prime minister, he understands he has to bring back the hostages. He has to. It's his mission right now.

I believe more than destroying Hamas. I really believe it's the second priority. He cannot say that. He cannot say that out loud. But I really believe so. No, but Israeli society is never going to heal.

Unless we bring the hostages back. That's right. And he knows that. It would be a permanent trauma. He knows that. And a matter of his legacy as well. Eli, I saw you said this week that Hamas is not holding the hostages for negotiation, you said. You said they're holding them to break them, to use them as pawns, to torture them for the world to see. Can you elaborate on that? What do you mean Hamas is not holding them for negotiations? I thought they were holding them as bargaining chips.

It feels like most of the time what they're trying to do is torture us, torture us, the families, torture them as human beings. They are spitting in the face of modern society, Western society, just spitting in our faces. Abusing them is abusing us. It's...

It's so horrible that sometimes I feel like they do it for fun. They don't do it only to apply more pressure on us, the Israelis. That's how it looks. They're just doing it because they are proud.

They are proud of keeping those people underground and torturing us like it's their victory on us. That they are still holding more than 500 days those innocent people. It's a victory for them. And I guess that really changes... You know, you're not an international policymaker, okay?

But it does change the way that you think about the way that negotiations should be approached if you think that Hamas is not holding the hostages just as bargaining chips. If you think Hamas is holding the hostages just as bargaining chips, which is a disgusting and abhorrent and evil thing in itself, then you say, okay, it wants to strike a deal. What deal can we get? What can you give? What can you give? And how can we reach something in the middle? But if you say, hang on, Hamas isn't holding them just as bargaining chips. Hamas sees its torture of the hostages as

As a weapon in the war against Israel, it sees its ability to starve and torture and abuse the hostages as a way to cause psychological torment to Israeli society, to terrorize Israeli society, to hurt the families, to tear the society apart. Then you begin to say...

Well, maybe there isn't a price that Israel can give it. There isn't a ransom that Israel can give it that will force it to release the hostages because they see holding onto the hostages as something that is an integral part of the war they're fighting itself. And that means that in order to get the hostages out, you can't just tell Israel, pay a bigger ransom, pay a bigger price. There has to be pressure on Hamas and its state sponsors so that they stop seeing holding onto the hostages as an asset.

Exactly. Tormenting us, the Israeli society, is part of their ideology. It's part of their narrative. They know how much the hostages as human beings are important to us. So they will try to do so as long as they can. And that's the biggest problem.

Eli, there's something I've been wondering about, and I want to pick your brains, not as the brother of Eviatar, but as another young Israeli guy. Okay? That's hard. I mean, that's my identity right now, being the big brother. If there is, God forbid, another hostage-taking incident in Israel,

And let's be honest, the chances of that have just gone up. The chances of another hostage-taking incident have gone up because we're releasing dangerous terrorists with blood on their hands and we know they're going to re-offend. And the chances of another hostage-taking incident have gone up because we're telling Hamas that taking hostages works. It's the first time that the terrorists have abducted civilians, not soldiers, civilians, and we're paying a ransom in order to get those civilians back and we're telling them hostage-taking works.

The chances of another hostage-shaking incident have gone up. That's a price that we, as Israeli society, have said we're willing to pay, a risk we're willing to take. We'll think about how to deal with that later because we have to get the hostages home now, okay? Now, if that happens, if, God forbid, you or I were to get abducted and Israel is going to negotiate for our release, first, they're going to try to get the children out. Then they're going to get the women out. Then they're going to get the elderly people out. Then they're going to get the sick and the wounded.

And the last people, maybe, maybe, maybe as a humanitarian gesture, they'll try to get out the fathers. But the last people who would be released in a hostage deal, in a ransom, before the male soldiers, will be young, single, healthy men like you and me. We would be the last ones out. That's right.

How does that make you feel? Just as a young Israeli guy, like my brother, like your brother, like Yaviotel. Hey, do you have two hours a day to watch a podcast? Do you? Oh my God, I need another two hour, hour podcast. Like I need a hole in the head. There you go. Right? So if you want to be entertained, you want to be enlightened, you can check us out on The Obvious where our podcasts are only...

20 minutes. Perfect. Maybe pushing 25. Yeah. They're great. But they're great. And they're pithy and they're on time. It's a weird combination of current affairs, association. Construction. Construction. Isn't it? Business. Right? Yeah. But it's a good time. It is a good time. So come join us on The Obvious. It's awful. I think we shouldn't allow the policy to be the same. I mean...

the Israeli state did not treated terror as it should we could do

we can make it different. We could actually, I think, win this war. Again, it is going to take decades to really establish a strong policy to fight terror and make sure that there will never be any more abductions. So as you said, it's more likely that terrorists will now want and try to abduct people, civilians.

But hopefully it was such a shocking event to the Israeli society that the policy will change. And we... I don't know how it will be really...

how it would really be on the field. But I'm sure, and we have to make sure as a society that the policy changes and terror all over Israel and around Israel will be destroyed completely. I mean, Hamas is, as I said, an ideology. And it's everywhere. It's in Lebanon. It's in Jordan. It's in Egypt. It's in Judea and Samaria. It's in London. It's in Paris. Exactly. All over the world. So...

We have to make sure we are making the biggest effort we can to destroy terror in general. Not using it as, you know, buying quiet from them. That cannot happen again. Right, so...

The chances of another hostage crisis have gone up and Israel is now going to have to think about how do we actively deter another hostage taking incident so we don't find ourselves in this horrific situation where we're taking civilians, ordinary citizens' lives and asking, who do we have to save first? That's a horrific thing to have to triage and say, well, okay, they're all humanitarian cases, but the children are more humanitarian and the women are more humanitarian and the elderly are more humanitarian. And then we're deciding who's less humanitarian. Yeah.

In order to deter any such terrorism and hostage-taking from happening again. And there's another thing, I think. We don't speak enough about the price if we will not bring them home. I think that's every time... God forbid, I hope no one will be abducted anymore. But it's crazy we're even having this discussion. Yes, it is. Maybe we shouldn't. Now I think about it. Maybe we shouldn't, but...

I think every citizen here has to know that the Israeli government, the Israeli society will do anything to bring him back to his family, back to his community, because that's a core value in the Israeli society. Leave no man behind. That's what we are established on. And that will be

our legacy as Jewish people, as Israeli people, I think till the end of days. And I think also a really powerful message for the rest of the international community that just wants this problem to go away. And I think, look, would it be fair to say most of the international community would be happy to just abandon the hostages?

If it was their problem? No, it's our problem. The Israeli hostages. Yeah, of course. Yeah. We know that none of the foreign policymakers are going to use any of their country's leverage.

to try to get the hostages out. These are not a top priority for them. But it means that the statement that we as Israeli society are making to the world is we're a country built on solidarity of people who care for each other, who do not abandon anyone in the field, not a soldier and certainly not a civilian. We care for each other. And I think that message that Israelis care for each other is something that really should inspire people around the world in societies that perhaps...

have less social solidarity. Yes. Eli, all of the listeners of this podcast are going to be people who are going to want to know what they can do to try to help free the hostages, to give you support as the hostages' families. And we're a little bit out of advice. We tell people, wear the pin, wear the dog tag, put up posters, post on social media,

But I feel that, you know, even I lack tools to try to help. And I try to host as many of these podcasts with relatives of hostages to try to raise awareness. Maybe if you want to turn to the camera here and speak directly to our listeners and viewers and tell them what you want from them and what they can do to help you and to help Aviatel. So, first of all, help us...

be our ambassadors, make the hostages visible. There are 24 young men begging to be saved and 35 others which are dead, unfortunately, but we have to bring them as well home to be buried. And we have to do whatever it takes to just make them as visible as we can. So

Put their posters everywhere. Be creative. Make big rallies, big prayers. Call the policymakers. Email them. All day. Because they cannot forget those innocent souls behind. They cannot forget our broken communities which have to be fixed and healed.

If you are in some kind of influence position, use it. Use it. Make a phone call. If you are close to Trump administration, please. First of all, I'm so grateful. So grateful for you. We know Trump's committed. President Trump's super committed to bring back all hostages and we have to keep pushing. We have to encourage him to do so because he understands what's good, what's right.

I mean, the only ticket I have is really try to make... I know Evitar, so I can tell about him. And that's my tool as a relative. But people around us can only make sure Evitar is visible. And hopefully, policymakers will do enough very soon. Because...

Elvatar is dying. My baby brother is dying and also dozens of others. Eli, we're going to race this episode out as quickly as possible because this is a humanitarian emergency and there's no time to spare.

But please, God, we'll have good news soon. And the pressure from the Trump administration, the banging on the table, maybe, maybe, maybe you successfully convinced them to apply pressure on Hamas's state sponsors as well. We'll do something and we'll get Evita and all the other hostages back home. Because as everyone who listens to this podcast knows, none of us are free till all of them are free. Eli David, thank you for coming on the show. Thank you.

And that brings us to the end of today's episode of State of a Nation with Eli David, whose brother, Eviatar, has been a hostage of Hamas for 517 days. Normally, I end these podcasts saying, if you like it, please give us a like, subscribe, forget all of that.

Please take a poster, a hostage poster, and stick it on your nearest lamppost. Cover your neighborhoods in hostage posters. Write a letter to your local representative. Do exactly what Eli asked you to do to raise international awareness about the hostages because the world wants to forget about them and we will not abandon our brothers and sisters who are rotting, dying, starving in the dungeons of Gaza. I'm Elon Levy, and thanks for joining us.