'Deep concern' over released hostages' health

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00:00There is deep concern.

00:01This is the first time that hostages have emerged looking evidently wan, very frail.

00:09Keith Siegel seemed to have trouble actually walking or lifting his arm when he was instructed

00:14to wave from that stage at Gaza Port.

00:17There is concern.

00:18It's also probably worth mentioning, in his case, he has known to be in very bad, frail

00:23health for a long time.

00:25We know that one of the hostages released two weeks ago, Emily Damari, was aware of

00:30his condition and requested for him to be released in her place.

00:35Hamas refused that.

00:37We also know that at the time that his wife, who was kidnapped with him, when Aviva Siegel

00:43was released in November 2023, she described him in very poor health.

00:49She described having been given one pita bread a day to eat and cutting it in half

00:55and hiding the second half so that her husband would have something to eat.

01:00So there are major concerns for his health, but all three of these men released today

01:04appear to be in some medical stress.

01:06Yeah.

01:07And you mentioned Keith Siegel's wife, Aviva.

01:09She of course launched this high-profile campaign to try and get Keith and other hostages freed.

01:16That's right.

01:19She and their daughter, one of their children, Shir, have been almost ubiquitous, not only

01:26here in Israel in the public sphere, but in the United States.

01:30And it's interesting to see how families of Israeli hostages feeling that they've basically,

01:38in some ways, been forsaken by their own government.

01:41Those who had access to other governments, such as the Siegel family, where Keith was

01:46American-born, have really turned very actively, both to the Biden administration and now with

01:53intense contacts with the Trump administration, to help release.

01:56I would say the same is true for Franco-Israeli citizens who have felt supported and been,

02:03as we saw here, publicly supported by the French government in a way that the Israeli

02:08government has simply not managed to do or chosen not to do for the families of hostages

02:13here in place.

02:15Another family reunion that will be taking place soon.

02:19The French-Israeli Ofer Calderon, released earlier this Saturday.

02:23His son and daughter were released in November 2023.

02:27I'm expecting some very powerful moments between them when they finally get to embrace once again.

02:35Right.

02:36I'm not sure we're going to actually see those images or see them quickly.

02:40There has been a bit of a shift here in Israel.

02:44The first hostages, the images of them first encountering their families, these incredibly

02:51intimate scenes, you know, every whimper, every glance, these were broadcast and released

02:57by the Israel government press office that had cameras waiting for them in the rooms.

03:02That received quite a bit of public blowback in the end.

03:05And what we've seen more recently, certainly on Thursday, are photographs that have been

03:11authorized by the families, released several hours later in some kind of an edited format

03:17that the, at least the family members accept.

03:20I think it's important to remember, though, these hostages who are being freed are all

03:24adults.

03:25They're all Israeli citizens who have the right to privacy like anyone else.

03:30And over the last few days, the way this has been covered has begun to be perceived as

03:35a real invasion of privacy.

03:38So I think today, especially, we should expect at least a few hours of wait until we see

03:44those sorts of images.

03:47The other man released this Saturday, we should mention, Yarden Bibas, something of a cause

03:52célèbre.

03:57Very much.

03:58Yarden Bibas has become a cause célèbre.

04:01He's a 35-year-old man.

04:04He is married to Shiri and the father of Ariel, who today is five if he's alive, and Kfir,

04:12who was taken hostage when he was just eight and a half months old.

04:16The images of Shiri Bibas sobbing, struggling as she's dragged out of her home in a nightie,

04:25holding, clutching her two small babies to her chest, these images have really become

04:29iconic.

04:30I think not just in Israel, but around the world, there have been all kinds of kind of

04:35redheaded homages all over the world, especially on the birthdays of these two boys.

04:41And we really know nothing about their fate, though there is major, major concern across

04:45the board.

04:46Hamas announced that they were dead and that they had been killed by an Israeli airstrike

04:52more than a year ago, but there's been no news since.

04:55Okay.

04:56And the next test, Noga, it appears for Israel and Hamas will come tomorrow.

05:01Talks expected to resume on the next stage of the ceasefire.

05:04What details do you have on that?

05:07Well, we don't have a lot of details, but we do know from Steve Whitkoff, Donald Trump's

05:14Middle East envoy who was here until yesterday, that the Trump administration is holding firm

05:19and demands that those talks resume.

05:22Prime Minister Netanyahu and many of his top ministers have said, some explicitly,

05:28that there will not be a phase two, that Israel will not return to these negotiations and

05:34certainly not withdraw from Gaza.

05:36That would leave 65 Israeli hostages living and dead, all of them men, many of them young

05:42men, soldiers, conscripted soldiers stuck in Gaza for an indefinite future.

05:47And that has caused an uproar in Israel.

05:50But Prime Minister Netanyahu seems a lot more sensitive to the pressure put by the

05:55United States.

05:56In fact, he took his most recalcitrant ministers this week to meet with Steve Whitkoff in an

06:03effort, I think, to persuade the White House on the one hand that he's in real political

06:08trouble and these ministers to understand that the United States really and truly is

06:13demanding this next step.

06:16Netanyahu will be traveling to Washington tomorrow and is expected to meet with Donald

06:21Trump on Tuesday.

06:22And one of the big questions hanging in the air is, will Trump be considerate of Netanyahu's

06:28fears of losing power or will he say, as we have heard Steve Whitkoff already said, your

06:33political problems are your problems, not ours?

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