Inside the hostage hotel, where freed Israelis come to terms with their new normal

No hotel is quite like it. It houses people who have had their faces on the front pages of newspapers all over the world. Others have had audiences with presidents, prime ministers, popes. Days are spent crying, hugging and – perhaps more unexpectedly – laughing.

This is the hostage hotel where, slowly, the Israelis who were held in the most appalling conditions by Hamas terrorists for 16 months are coming to terms with their new normal. It is a cocoon-like environment for post-hospital care – which is why we’re not reporting its name – to protect people who are both physically and mentally beginning their journeys to health and starting their lives again.

“It is quite a surreal place, a surreal experience to be there,” says Michael Levy, whose brother, Or, was released on February 8 – one of three men whose startlingly emaciated appearances was a reminder of the horrific conditions in which the hostages have been held.

British-Israeli hostage Emily Damari and her mother, Mandy, on a call with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer after her release from captivity in Gaza.Credit: via REUTERS

“Over this time, the other hostage families have become my family. But now I see the hostages, too, and that feels strange because I am used to seeing their faces in this little picture ... then you see them in real life, and they have a voice and they are taller or shorter than you imagined. For the hostages, it helps – in the hotel you can see them talking between themselves about their experiences, even if they never met before.”

Several floors of the specialist hotel, which is used mainly by patients of the nearest hospital, have been reserved just for hostages – and for the past few weeks, the number of them has grown. Emily Damari, the 28-year-old British-Israeli citizen released by Hamas last month, was taken to the hotel after being reunited with her mother, Mandy, following her release.

The hostages have come back with myriad complex health issues, including malnutrition, muscle weakness, gastrointestinal problems, infections, fractures and untreated injuries from when they were first taken. Many are also suffering from significant emotional and psychological distress – a result of the trauma of October 7, 2023, their incarceration and the terror of the Hamas “parade” on their release – which manifests as nightmares, hypervigilance and emotional numbness.

People watch the helicopter carrying released hostage Ohad Ben Ami as it arrives at Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv.Credit: Getty Images

Each hostage has a large room or even a suite so that friends and family can sleep over. Key family members, like Michael, also have their own bedrooms near to their loved ones which they can use as a base and come and go to their own homes as they like. Families, too, are seen as needing help after 16 months in torturous limbo.

Or is frequently joined by his three-year-old son, Almog. His wife, Eynav, was murdered by Hamas on October 7 when they threw a grenade into the shelter where she was hiding, before taking Or and three others as hostages.

“Or told us that even in the worst situations, what kept him alive was that he had promised himself that he would come back for Almog,” says Michael. “They were apart for a year and four months, but it was like they have never been apart. One of the things that helps me understand that he’s OK is that he has come back and acts like a dad. That is the best part for me, just sitting and watching him be a dad.”

The hotel has a special dining room for the hostages where each family has their own table and they can choose when to eat – giving the hostages choice is a huge part of their rehabilitation. On Friday nights, the beginning of the Sabbath, a tradition has begun where all the families eat together.

Israeli hostage Or Levy is released by Hamas to the Red Cross on February 8.Credit: AP

“I know it sounds strange, but the Friday nights have become fun,” says Michael. “Everyone eats and then we play board games, we chat, we laugh. There are moments where I think, ‘I can’t believe I am in this strange situation’. It is something I could have never imagined.”

There are several lounges where the news is often on. The hostages, if they wish, can sit and watch their releases, which are frequently discussed on Israeli news channels. Some families stay away from the news. Last week, when the bodies of the Bibas family and Oded Lifshitz were returned was “one of the saddest days I can recall”, says Michael, but it was swiftly followed by the relief and the joy when six hostages were released on Saturday.

On Thursday, four more hostage bodies are due for release as the first stage of the ceasefire deal comes to an end. Or and all the other hostages are determined to keep fighting for a second stage of the deal which will see the remaining 63 hostages – it is believed about 25 of them are alive – released. They won’t be able to recover until everyone is home.

“Survivor’s guilt is prevalent as many struggle with the reality that fellow hostages remain in captivity,” says Professor Hagai Levine, head of the health team at the Hostages and Missing Families Forum. “True recovery for them can only start when the living are brought home for rehabilitation and the deceased are returned for burial.”

Or Levy, Eli Sharabi and Ohad Ben Ami were abducted and taken to Gaza on October 7, 2023.

Or was held with musician Alon Ohel as well as Eli Sharabi, who was released to find his British wife, Lianne, and their two daughters were dead, and Eliya Cohen, who was released on Saturday. “He will be using his voice to get his brother hostages, especially Alon, home. Our mission does not stop here,” says Michael, who has travelled across the world and met the Pope as part of his determination to keep the hostages in the public eye.

The hostages have come out of Gaza to find themselves in almost unique positions. They are world famous – their stories having been told by their families repeatedly in an effort to keep the pressure on to bring them back. Their highly staged and traumatic releases were televised live by news channels, their emotional reunions with their family members were also shown as a comfort for those millions around the world who have taken the hostages to their hearts.

But the hostages were previously private individuals facing numerous issues. They return to a world that looks very different to the early hours of October 7, 2023, when they last experienced freedom.

Many of them have arrived back in Israel to learn their homes were destroyed, their families and friends were killed, and that everything has changed.

“At the moment, we are trying to keep people away from him – I have tried to explain that everyone knows his face,” says Michael of his brother. “I’ve told him how he cannot just go outside without someone wanting to hug him or to cry with him or even take a selfie because that’s how excited people are. It even affects the family members. On the Monday, after he came back, I was in a taxi and when the driver looked at me, he said, ‘Oh my God, it’s you! It’s you!’ and he couldn’t speak. And that was just me, not even my brother.

Yocheved Lifshitz talks to Israeli President Issac Herzog during the funeral for her husband, hostage Oded Lifshitz, in Nir Oz, Israel.Credit: Getty Images

“One day, my brother was in the hotel lobby when a very famous comedian in Israel, who happened to be in the hotel, saw him. He came and asked for a hug and my brother couldn’t understand how the hell this famous man knew him. That was very strange for him.”

Lessons have been learnt from previous hostage releases about how to best protect them, says Dr Einat Yehene, a psychologist who is head of rehabilitation at the health division in the Hostages and Missing Families Forum. “After the euphoric days that follow their release, when they get to go home, that is when difficulties start to emerge,” she says. “And our underlying assumption is that a hostage being released after 500 days in Hamas captivity is not the same as someone who has spent 50 days there. So those who are being released in this deal will necessitate a much more comprehensive rehabilitation.”

This is where the hotel fits in. It is a sort of halfway house where they can continue their recovery – with physiotherapists, psychologists, nutritionists and all manner of other specialists – in privacy, alongside other people who understand exactly what they are going through.

When the hostages emerge from Gaza, their families have no idea what to expect. Often, they have heard nothing about their loved ones since the attack – not even if they were alive. In hospital, the hostages undergo a series of tests both physical and mental. There are also meetings with the Israeli Defence Forces and sometimes the families of other hostages still being held. The hostages then have the decision about whether they want to move into the hotel with the others. Many of them, who were taken from their homes, no longer have houses to go back to. Others are not ready to return home, knowing their loved ones are dead.

The hostage families have been warned to not bombard their loved ones with questions or with information but Michael says on the first night Or was released, they stayed up until 7am talking. Some of it was hard to hear – for most of his captivity, he was starved, tortured and kept in a dark tunnel 70cm wide and too low for him to stand up.

Two weeks before he was released, Hamas started to feed him and had to teach him how to walk again. “He was almost killed so many times that it became a habit for him,” says Michael. “He will mention something over breakfast and I will just be in shock. But at the same time, he came back sharp, he knows what he wants to eat, what he wants to achieve, and he’s come back with a checklist of things he wants to do, and we have to tell him to slow down – he has a lot to recover from.”

There is no fixed time for how long the hostages will stay at the hotel. For each of them, their choice, after more than a year of being refused a single choice, is what is paramount. “It feels like a strange sort of holiday from the outside world,” says Michael. “But when Or is ready to make a decision about what comes next, we will be there. He is going to need time for things to heal – maybe his whole life – but he is getting ready for normal life. Or as normal as it can be.”

The Telegraph, London