Macabre video of the last hostages held by Hamas shocks Israel
In the videos, Evyatar David, 24, one of the last 20 presumed living hostages in Hamas' custody − alongside the dead bodies of 29 others − was filmed by his captors. In the video, he is emaciated, with a gaunt face and pronounced bones, and describes the conditions in captivity. He was abducted while attending a music festival near Gaza. Later, his guards force him to dig a grave in the tunnel where he is being held. "I am digging my own grave, every day I am weaker," he says.
Another hostage, Rom Braslavski, 22, also appeared in a state of exhaustion, in a particularly degrading video published by Islamic Jihad, a Hamas ally in Gaza. In the footage, he writhes in pain on the ground, explaining that he can no longer move.
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France 24
39 minutes ago
- France 24
'He must be saved!': Brother of emaciated Israeli hostage pleads for his release
David, 24, is one of 251 people taken captive by Hamas and its allies during their October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel, which triggered the war in Gaza. Last week, Hamas released propaganda videos showing him severely undernourished and visibly weakened, including one in which he digs with a shovel in the sandy floor of a tunnel, saying he is preparing his grave. "The world must come together now... and demand his release. He must be saved!" his brother Ilay David said in an interview Tuesday with AFP in Kfar Saba, near Tel Aviv, at the family home where they both were raised. The recent videos of Evyatar David and fellow hostage Rom Braslavski have sparked outrage and fear for their safety among Israelis, as well as condemnations of Hamas from abroad. In captivity for nearly 22 months, David has since become a symbol of the ongoing ordeal of the 20 hostages believed to still be alive among the 49 held by Hamas. Red and black posters demanding his release hang on the walls of the family's living room, the same posters that plaster walls across Israel in solidarity with the hostages. On February 23, Hamas had released a video showing David sitting in a vehicle alongside another hostage as they were forced to watch a staged ceremony marking the release of three other captives during a brief ceasefire that later collapsed. "That was the last sign of life we had from him," Ilay David told AFP. "We thought then that was the worst possible cruelty," he added. "We didn't think (Hamas) could go any lower." "These new images show just how urgent it is to get him out of that tunnel." Unable to watch Ilay admitted he had only seen still images from the latest five-minute Hamas video showing his brother. "I wasn't able to watch it or listen to it. Seeing it with my mother would completely wreck us," he told AFP. Evyatar "is my little brother. We grew up together, played music together. I was raised to protect my younger siblings," he continued. "He hasn't given up -- and neither will we, until he comes home." In a statement, the David family warned that their son "has only a few days left to live in his current condition", expressing outrage at the "deliberate starvation, torture, and abuse" he is enduring. Evyatar David was abducted along with his childhood friend Guy Gilboa-Dalal from the Nova music festival near the Gaza border, where more than 370 people were killed and 44 taken hostage. The two friends spent more than eight months in Hamas tunnels with Tal Shoham, a man abducted from a kibbutz and released in February after more than 500 days in captivity. Only in a cemetery In an interview with AFP on Tuesday, Shoham, now 40 years old, described the torment the three hostages endured together. "We suffered from severe starvation. I lost 30 kilograms (66 pounds) during my captivity, Guy and Evyatar each lost at least 25. And now, I believe they've lost another 15 to 20 kilos." He recalled the cruelty of their captors, who ate meat in front of them while giving them as little as a single portion of pita bread a day. The three captives were held inside an apartment until June 2024, when they were moved into a tunnel. "I thought I had already experienced the worst, but I was wrong," Shoham said of his time underground. He said he recognised the tunnel shown in the latest video as the one where he spent months on a mattress, haunted by "the hunger, the humidity and the inability to breathe". In the most recent footage, Shoham said he could see in David's eyes that "he has lost all hope". "I used to imagine their return -- the tears, the reunion, the hugs," he said, referring to David and Gilboa-Dallal. © 2025 AFP
Euronews
2 hours ago
- Euronews
Why is Slovenia the only EU country to ban arms trade with Israel?
In the absence of a consensus at European level, Slovenia is going it alone. On Thursday, it became the first EU country to ban all arms trade with Israel, including transit and imports. In a press release, the Slovenian government explicitly outlined its concerns about the humanitarian situation in Gaza and denounced the EU's inability to adopt such a measure because of "internal disagreements." The decision is above all symbolic, since the Slovenian government says it has not issued any arms export permits to Israel since October 2023 because of the conflict. This decision is intended to intensify the pressure on the Israeli state to put an end to the war in Gaza. "All measures are on the table, we support, as we have done in the past, the suspension of the accession agreement with Israel, as well as trade sanctions and an arms embargo, sanctions against certain settlers, certain ministers and the Israeli government that supports violence", declared Tanja Fajon, Slovenia's Minister of Foreign Affairs, on 15 July in Brussels. "All measures must be taken as soon as possible, until there is a ceasefire, until the violence has stopped, until we have a resolution between the two countries", she added. Falling sales Other European countries such as Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands have not gone as far as Slovenia, but have reduced arms sales to Israel. Belgium officially banned arms exports to Israel following the 2008-2009 Gaza war. In the Netherlands, the Court of Appeal in The Hague annulled the export of F-35 spare parts to Israel in February 2024. The 2013 Arms Trade Treaty prohibits states from transferring weapons that will be used to commit genocide or crimes against humanity. In 2008, EU countries also undertook to refuse transfers of technology and military equipment that could be used to prolong armed conflicts. "For European states, there is an obligation not only not to export equipment that could be used to commit crimes in Gaza, but also not to export equipment that could be used to maintain the land, air or naval dimensions of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories," Samuel Longuet, a researcher at the Groupe de recherche et d'information sur la paix et la sécurité (GRIP), told Euronews. "So this covers virtually all the military equipment that could be used by the Israeli army." Continued exports Meanwhile, European exports of military equipment to Israel continue. Some countries state that the parts are only assembled in Israel or that they are used as training equipment, and not in Gaza. "The work of several human rights associations in Italy, as well as the Italian investigative press, revealed that the Italian government had just suspended the granting of new export licences, but everything that had been authorised before 7 October 2023 was still going to Israel. In particular parts for training aircraft," explains Longuet. The transfer of dual-use technologies, which can be used for both civilian and military purposes, also poses a problem. In Belgium, the Flemish region allowed a local company to export "screens that ended up in the control cabins of Israeli drones that were used to bomb a humanitarian convoy a few months ago," the researcher said. "The argument put forward by the Flemish government at the time, before 7 October, in March 2023, was that this was a generic technology, a screen that could be found, yes, in a drone control cabin, but also in anything else. And so in this case, it didn't require the company supplying these screens to apply for an export licence, since it wasn't strictly speaking a military technology", he points out. The United States is by far the leading supplier of weapons to Israel. It accounts for two-thirds of Israeli arms imports, with Germany and Italy coming in second and third places. Germany mainly sells frigates and torpedoes, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. "What we export is a little bit of everything in fact. Parts that can be used on Israeli ships, so equipment that will be used in naval systems. We also supply parts for training aircraft," says Longuet. "The UK and Italy, for example, export parts for the Italian M-346 aircraft used to train future Israeli fighter pilots," he explains. At the European level, an arms embargo is unlikely to succeed. It would have to be approved unanimously by the EU Council. However, Longuet says countries such as Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic, staunch supporters of Israel, would likely block it.
France 24
3 hours ago
- France 24
S.Africa urges more countries to stand up to Israel's 'genocidal activities'
Pretoria has been a leading critic of Israel's actions in Gaza, bringing a case before the UN's top court in December 2023 arguing that its war in the Palestinian territory amounted to genocide. As some of Israel's allies "are now also saying, no, this can't continue, it means that it is bringing us closer and closer to the Israel regime to stop the genocidal activities", Lamola said. This will also boost efforts to "allow humanitarian access to the people of Gaza" and "to agree to go into a negotiation table to cease the fire", he said. "We really welcome this development, and we call for more countries to continue to recognise Palestine." "We welcome the intention to recognise by France, Canada, and all countries of the world. This will put the pressure so that we can end up with ceasefire," Lamola said. South Africa's case before the International Court of Justice argues that the war in Gaza, which began with the militant group Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, breached the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention. Israel has strongly denied that accusation. Several nations have added their weight to the proceedings, including Spain, Bolivia, Colombia, Mexico, Turkey, Chile and Libya. The leaders of France, the United Kingdom and Canada have meanwhile said they plan to recognise a Palestinian state in September, and urged other nations to do so. The announcements by some of Washington's closest allies have displeased US President Donald Trump. Lamola said that had the world acted when South Africa made its case at the ICJ, "we would not be where we are". "It's clear starvation is emerging, famine, and all these are things we warned about in our ICJ case -- that this will lead to famine, will lead to complete cleansing of the population," he said. © 2025 AFP
