Brother of former hostage Eli Sharabi says he was tortured and starved while captive in Gaza
The image of Israeli hostage Eli Sharabi being released from Gaza a little over two weeks ago, looking gaunt and weak, shocked and angered Israel and leaders around the world.
His brother Sharon, who fought for months to secure his release, has told Sky News that Eli was tortured by Hamas and barely saw daylight but is slowly recovering his strength after almost sixteen months in Gaza.
“Since day one, Eli was held in extremely difficult conditions, dozens of metres beneath the ground and the treatment he received from his captors was very, very humiliating and very threatening,” said Sharon.
Sharon, being an observant Jew, didn’t watch the live television feed of his brother’s release because it happened over shabbat, but he barely recognised his sibling when they were reunited a few hours later in hospital.
Eli Sharabi and his family
Eli being escorted by Hamas fighters before being handed over to the Red Cross. Pic: AP
“Eli was starved in an extreme way. He was humiliated, beaten. He didn’t receive minimal conditions for living. The most basic things a person needs for his health – to breathe clean air, to drink clean water.
“He was kept in very difficult conditions in captivity, which included extreme starvation, torture, humiliations, for 16 months in the tunnels of Hamas, I think his appearance says it all.”
Eli was taken from his home in kibbutz Be’eri on 7 October 2023.
“I will be back, I’ll come back to you,” he had promised his British wife Lianne, and teenage daughters Noiya and Yahel as he was being dragged into Gaza.
Sharon Sharabi
They were murdered shortly after.
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As Eli was paraded on stage by Hamas before his release, he said he was looking forward to being reunited with them – it was only when he reached Israel that he found out they were dead.
“Only once he was in the safe arms of Israel, Eli received the news, when he was told that our mother and older sister were waiting for him [at the border],” explained Sharon.
The family had been given specialist advice to help them deliver the tragic news to Eli.
Eli Sharabi and his family
“Then he asked, ‘where are Lianne and the girls?’ And when they told him that they hadn’t survived October 7th, it broke his heart.
“We know that from this extremely low point, the lowest point possible, you cannot go down further. We are going to embrace Eli, and we are going to let him process this terrible loss.”
Eli’s release, after 490 days in captivity, was a bittersweet moment for the family.
Yossi Sharabi, Eli and Sharon’s brother was also kidnapped on 7 October 2023 and his body is still in Gaza.
The Sharabi brothers
Hamas said Yossi had been killed by Israeli airstrikes, which an IDF investigation said was likely.
Though it couldn’t rule out the possibility he was murdered by his Hamas captors.
The family are campaigning to get him back so he can be buried properly. Any disruption to the ceasefire could threaten that.
“We’ve been in this struggle for 16 months now and I think that everyone deserves, at the very least, for their people to be brought back for a final resting place.
“If not on their feet and alive, then at least, even if that person lost his life, he should be brought back with dignity, he needs to be given the proper respect, to be brought back to his soil, to his land.
“Yossi is sorely missed, it’s a great loss to mankind in general, but especially to his family, his wife and daughters, who had survived Hamas’s brutal attack on October 7th.
“And my commitment, just as I fought for Eli, I’ll fight for Yossi, and for all the hostages, until the very last one, in order to try and process what happened to us and especially to try and return to my private ordinary life, the life I had before October 7th.”
The first phase of the Gaza ceasefire is almost complete – four more bodies of hostages are due to be released on Thursday – but there has been little negotiation on the next phase.
Unless an agreement can be reached to temporarily extend phase one, then the war could resume, and with 63 hostages still being held in Gaza.
World
Trump criticises Putin after potentially ‘historic’ meeting with Zelenskyy before Pope’s funeral
Donald Trump has criticised Vladimir Putin and suggested a shift in his stance towards the Russian president after a meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy before the Pope’s funeral.
The Ukrainian president said the one-on-one talks could prove to be “historic” after pictures showed him sitting opposite Mr Trump, around two feet apart, in the large marble hall inside St Peter’s Basilica.
The US president said he doubted his Russian counterpart’s willingness to end the war after leaving Rome after the funeral of Pope Francis at the Vatican.
Follow live updates: 200,000 mourn at Vatican
In a post on his Truth Social platform, he said “there was no reason” for the Russian president “to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days”.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
He added: “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian leaders was their first face-to-face encounter since a very public row in the Oval Office in February.
Mr Zelenskyy said he had a good meeting with Mr Trump in which they talked about the defence of the Ukrainian people, a full and unconditional ceasefire, and a durable and lasting peace that would prevent the war restarting.
Other images released by the Ukrainian president’s office show Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron were present for part of the talks, which were described as “positive” by the French presidency.
Mr Zelenskyy‘s spokesman said the meeting lasted for around 15 minutes and he and Mr Trump had agreed to hold further discussions later on Saturday.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet in the Basilica
But the US president left Rome for Washington on Air Force One soon after the funeral without any other talks having taken place.
The Ukrainian president’s office said there was no second meeting in Rome because of the tight schedule of both leaders, although he had separate discussions with Mr Starmer and Mr Macron.
The French president said in a post on X “Ukraine is ready for an unconditional ceasefire” and that a so-called coalition of the willing, led by the UK and France, would continue working to achieve a lasting peace.
There was applause from some of the other world leaders in attendance at the Vatican when Mr Zelenskyy walked out of St Peter’s Basilica after stopping in front of the pontiff’s coffin to pay his respects.
Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president met for the first time since their Oval Office row. Pic: Reuters
Sir Tony Brenton, the former British ambassador to Russia, said the event presents diplomatic opportunities, including the “biggest possible meeting” between Mr Trump and the Ukrainian leader.
He told Sky News it could mark “an important step” in starting the peace process between Russia and Ukraine.
Professor Father Francesco Giordano told Sky News the meeting is being called “Pope Francis’s miracle” by members of the clergy, adding: “There’s so many things that happened today – it was just overwhelming.”
The bilateral meeting comes after Mr Trump’s peace negotiator Steve Witkoff held talks with Mr Putin at the Kremlin.
They discussed “the possibility of resuming direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine”, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said.
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Russia and Ukraine have not held direct talks since the early weeks of the war, which began in February 2022.
Mr Trump has claimed a deal to end the war is “very close” and has urged Mr Zelenskyy to “get it done” in a post on his Truth Social platform.
He has previously warned both sides his administration would walk away from its efforts to achieve a peace if the two sides do not agree a deal soon.
Meanwhile, the Polish armed forces said a Russian military helicopter violated its airspace over the Baltic Sea on Friday evening.
“The nature of the incident indicates that Russia is testing the readiness of our air defence systems,” they said in a post on X.
On an extraordinary day, remarkable pictures on the margins that capture what may be a turning point for the world.
In a corner of St Peter’s Basilica before the funeral of Pope Francis, the leaders of America and Ukraine sit facing each other in two solitary chairs.
They look like confessor and sinner except we cannot tell which one is which.
Leaning forward hands together in their laps, Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy stare at each other in one photo.
In another, the Ukrainian president seems to be remonstrating with the US president. This is their first encounter since their infamous bust-up in the Oval Office.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
Other pictures show the moment their French and British counterparts introduced the two men. There is a palpable sense of nervousness in the way the leaders engage.
We do not know what the two presidents said in their brief meeting.
But in the mind of the Ukrainian leader will be the knowledge President Trump has this week said America will reward Russia for its unprovoked brutal invasion of his country, under any peace deal.
Mr Trump has presented Ukraine and Russia with a proposal and ultimatum so one-sided it could have been written in the Kremlin.
Kyiv must surrender the land Russia has taken by force, Crimea forever, the rest at least for now. And it must submit to an act of extortion, a proposed deal that would hand over half its mineral wealth effectively to America.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Afterwards, Zelenskyy said it had been a good meeting that could turn out to be historic “if we reach results together”.
They had talked, he said, about the defence of Ukraine, a full and unconditional ceasefire and a durable and lasting peace that will prevent a war restarting.
The Trump peace proposal includes only unspecified security guarantees for Ukraine from countries that do not include the US. It rules out any membership of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s allies are watching closely to see if Mr Trump will apply any pressure on Vladimir Putin, let alone punish him for recent bloody attacks on Ukraine.
Or will he simply walk away if the proposal fails, blaming Ukrainian intransigence, however outrageously, before moving onto a rapprochement with Moscow.
If he does, America’s role as guarantor of international security will be seen effectively as over.
This could be the week we see the world order as we have known it since the end of the Second World War buried, as well as a pope.
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