Israeli hostage, 84, released by Hamas in 'fight for her life'

Elma Avraham, 84, who was released after being taken hostage during the October 7 attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas, appears in this undated handout image, obtained by Reuters on November 26, 2023. Hostages and Missing Families Forum/Handout via REUTERS

By Emily Rose

JERUSALEM (Reuters) -When Elma Avraham, 84, was taken hostage from her home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz in Israel on Oct. 7 she was an independent member of the community, her relatives said.

When Hamas released her on Sunday, she was in a “fight for her life”, according to hospital staff.

The great-grandmother was freed with 16 other hostages, including a four-year-old American girl named Abigail Edan, on the third day of a truce between Israel and Hamas.

While the other hostages are reported to have returned in good health, Avraham’s daughter told reporters her mother arrived with a pulse of 40 and a body temperature of 28 degrees. The deputy administrator of Soroka hospital in Beersheba said her condition remains critical and she is ventilated and sedated in the intensive care unit.

“They held her in terrible conditions,” daughter Tali Amano said outside the hospital. “My mother arrived hours before we would have lost her.”

“She was kept in harsh conditions,” Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said. “She was denied life-saving medications. She was not visited by the Red Cross.”

He said the woman was “a reminder of our critical mission” but asked “who is taking care of other hostages in Gaza?”

Amano described her mother as “happy, connected, and embraced by the entire community” before she was taken and said that while her mother had chronic health conditions, they were entirely in check.

“For fifty-two days they kept her in conditions that no human being should be kept in,” the head of medical affairs from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, Hagai Levine said, “Simply without human dignity, unreasonable abuse.”

Amano said she met with the Red Cross and pleaded with them to give medication to her mother but was told they could not deliver them.

“We stood at the entrance, with a package of medications for her,” Amano said. “My mother didn’t need to return this way and I have no idea how she will make it through these days.”

An ICRC spokesperson told Reuters: “We have been meeting directly with families and they have urged us to take possession of personal medications, but we’re not able to take them.”

“We continue calling for access to the hostages, as we’ve done from Day 1, and we are ready to carry out those visits,” the spokesperson added.

They said a medical doctor had accompanied Avraham as she and hostages were taken out of Gaza.

(Reporting by Emily Rose; Editing by Christina Fincher and Angus MacSwan)