2023-12-28 16:21:04
Published28. December 2023, 5:21 p.m
Israel: “New level of cruelty” – Hamas hostages severely traumatized
Even though they have made it out of Hamas’s clutches, the horror for the former Hamas hostages is not yet over. Horrible memories keep coming back to haunt her.
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Many children were among the hostages kidnapped by Hamas. This “wounded” teddy was placed in Tel Aviv to raise awareness.
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Israelis are still under Hamas control.
REUTERS
But the suffering of the people in Gaza is also immeasurable. Israeli air strikes repeatedly kill civilians, including many children.
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That’s what it’s regarding
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Freed Hamas hostages are suffering the consequences of their captivity, according to psychiatrist Renana Eitan.
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Many of them were severely traumatized and suffered from nightmares and dissociative symptoms.
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Your healing process will probably be extremely lengthy and difficult.
Many hostages who were released from the hands of Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip in November still require intensive psychiatric treatment weeks later. The hostages suffered the worst abuse and trauma that she had experienced in her career, said Renana Eitan, head of psychiatry at the Ichilov Center in Tel Aviv, to the newspaper “The Guardian”. During a ceasefire at the end of November, more than 100 hostages were released, and Israel released 240 Palestinian prisoners in return.
Of the 14 hostages being treated by her team, nine were under 18 and two were children under 10, Eitan said. Most of them required long-term trauma treatment. These include children who were drugged with ketamine during their captivity and suffered from severe withdrawal symptoms, as well as those who were sexually abused or had to witness sexual abuse.
Drugged with ketamine and kept in a cage
Ketamine is an anesthetic that is administered under the skin or intravenously and causes those affected to be virtually disconnected from their environment for a while. The psychiatrist suspects that the ketamine was also used to calm and control the children so that they did not have to care for them. One of the women was also kept in a cage measuring one and a half meters, Eitan was quoted as saying. Another had to spend four days underground in complete darkness. “She became psychotic and hallucinated.”
«When they returned, they initially seemed very happy and relieved. And we were also very optimistic,” she said. But following just one or two days it was discovered that the victims were suffering from severe nightmares and “are very, very scared”. Most were severely physically and mentally abused. «I thought I had already taken care of the worst cases. But a new level of cruelty has been reached with the patients who are released from hostage confinement,” says Eitan. “We know they still have a long way to go.”
In their minds they are still in Gaza
Some of the ex-hostages were afraid to leave the room and had severe dissociative symptoms. One moment they knew they were in a hospital, the next they thought they were still in Hamas captivity, Eitan told the Guardian. Others didn’t want to sleep because they thought they were still in Gaza when they woke up.
Hundreds of thousands of children and their parents in the Gaza Strip are also severely traumatized by the consequences of the ongoing war. Psychiatrists and psychologists warned of long-term consequences, especially since there are no longer any therapeutic facilities in the coastal strip sealed off by Israel, the newspaper continued. Only a few hospitals in Gaza are still functioning.
The Gaza war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel’s history, which terrorists from Hamas and other extremist groups carried out in Israel on October 7th.
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(DPA/eve)
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