Survivors recount horrific abuse and terror endured in Gaza captivity

When Aviva Siegel looks back on those 51 days spent as a prisoner in Gaza, the image of Israeli women returning from rape, bleeding and bruised, fills her mind with terror. She tells the Daily Mail from her home in northern Israel that she saw girls beaten into pieces. One girl returned after abuse looking purple, and Aviva admitted she wanted to die just knowing what happened to them.

Women around the 65-year-old were forced by their Hamas captors into wearing tight clothing that did not fit. They had to shower naked in front of terrorists while one guard entered the bathroom and made a girl perform oral sex. Keith, her husband, sat next to her during this interview. He was kidnapped alongside her from Kibbutz Kfar Aza on October 7, 2023, which became one of the hardest-hit communities during Hamas deadly onslaught.

It has been almost three years since that fateful day, yet the couple is still haunted by a mental album of pictures from Gaza. Sometimes those images run after Aviva and try to control her head, she says. Keith, now 67, was not freed until he had spent 484 days in the enclave. He still finds himself obsessively showering because he feels imprinted by dirt and dust found underground in tunnels. I even think today that I cannot get rid of some of it, he admits while discussing his weird thoughts about being clean.

Keith Siegel was released American-Israeli hostage seized during deadly October 7 attack by Hamas before embracing his wife Aviva after release on February 1, 2025. Former Hamas hostage Aviva wears a t-shirt with a picture of her husband Keith Siegel. He was delivered to Red Cross fighters from Ezz al-Din Al-Qassam brigades at Gaza port in Gaza City on that same date.

Aviva was born in South Africa and released a book about her harrowing experience in March called The Main Thing is to Wake up to a New Morning. This work followed her November 2023 release from captivity. Everybody who reads the book will feel what it is like to be a hostage in Gaza underneath ground feeling like end of world, she says regarding its impact on readers.

Their story starts same as thousands other Israeli survivors massacre which saw 1,200 people killed and 250 taken captive by Hamas. On morning of October 7 couple bolted up at 6:30am to sound of sirens blaring loudly outside their residence. At 10:30am Hamas gunmen stormed their home and broke into safe room where they were hiding away from danger.

They pulled us violently and brutally out of safe room into living room where we were surrounded by between ten and fifteen terrorists screaming at each other while also screaming at us, Keith recalls the chaos. During brutal kidnapping militants ordered couple to exit home through back window after forcing them outside against their will. Keith ribs were broken and meniscus in Aviva knee was torn during this ordeal on that terrible day.

On way to car terrorists shot Keith in arm before they reached vehicle waiting nearby. Once inside vehicle couple sat petrified while one militant held knife to faces of both hostages and another held gun pointed directly at them. In Gaza Aviva was told to wear hijab while Keith was put into robe by captors controlling their movements strictly.

Couple were kept together but that brought little solace for Aviva who remained constantly terrified she would witness husband death by asphyxiation in torturous tunnel network underground where oxygen levels dropped dangerously low. After couple days Keith looked at me and said he could not breathe because there was lack of oxygen present in air, she explains what happened inside those dark places. I also could not breathe myself while trying to figure out what was happening or if we were just going to die that night. I said to him Just lie down and try and breathe during those moments when hope seemed lost completely away from everyone else watching over us safely at home back in Israel waiting for news daily until finally liberation arrived after so many long months passed slowly by without end yet still coming eventually one way or another despite all odds stacked heavily against them both throughout entire ordeal together as family unit facing unimaginable horrors every single day under constant threat of death looming large above heads constantly while surrounded by violence everywhere around us no matter how hard we tried escaping capture again and again only to fail repeatedly until rescue finally came after such a long wait

Aviva Siegel recalls the moment she lay down next to her husband, terrified even to meet his eyes. She says she told herself not to look at Keith because seeing him dead was too much. Her only thought was a desperate plea for death itself, hoping it would come before she had to witness that finality.

For most of her time in Gaza, Aviva learned how to shut off her mind from her body. Complete dissociation became necessary because the pain was simply too heavy to carry. Letting feelings surface meant facing an urge to end her own life that felt impossible to ignore. The images were brutal and relentless. Girls being beaten, Keith under threat, and the slow starvation of a man who could barely stand up to reach a bathroom. Those moments drove her desire for death so strong she just wanted it all to stop.

The couple stood before the United Nations Committee against Torture in November last year to share their testimony. They spoke about the systematic sexual abuse and torture Hamas captors inflicted on them. Keith described how his own intimate parts were compared to those of another hostage, with knives held as a constant threat. He begged just for permission to use the bathroom while others watched.

Denied every basic human right, he starved and went without water. More than once, young terrorists forced him to strip naked in front of them and shaved his body against his will. Aviva recounted the horror suffered by a sixteen-year-old female hostage who had never shown her body to anyone before. A captor stood there, staring and smiling as the assault happened. Both women were left in a state of shock that lasted for so many minutes it felt like hours.

Keith told the Daily Mail how things turned darker on December 1, 2023. That was when the temporary ceasefire collapsed and Israeli bombardment resumed. The terrorists became even more cruel and violent overnight. He described lying flat on his back while a captor stood over him screaming curses. Spittle was thrown in his face, followed by kicks to his legs and ribs.

Trapped inside the tunnels, he could not stand up without permission. Every request for water or air required begging. The weight loss was staggering. Keith lost about 35kg from starvation alone, while Aviva shed 10kg during their captivity.

Aviva Siegel watched her captors gain weight while they ate constantly right before her eyes. She remembers the scene vividly. They showed zero care for their behavior. Keith Siegel is now safe at home, but his journey through hell has just begun to be told.

Hamas freed Aviva after 51 days inside Gaza as part of a temporary ceasefire deal. Qatar and the US brokered this agreement. Alongside her, thirteen other Israeli hostages and three foreign nationals walked away from captivity. She did not yet know then that Keith would stay in the Strip for another year, two months, and six days.

Guards initially refused to let her say goodbye. Aviva simply would not take no for an answer. I said to him, You'll be strong for me, and I'll be strong for you. She recalls feeling that deep inside my heart. That exchange marked a turning point in their separation.

Keith was moved constantly between thirty different locations in the enclave. He passed through tunnels, schools, apartments, and homes while encountering sixty terrorists. For six months straight, he remained in total isolation without seeing anyone else. To keep his mind sane, he kept a mental stock of his surroundings. He retained a sense of curiosity even then.

He attempted to learn Arabic as a coping mechanism. He said good morning and good night to his captors in their language. He thanked them every time for food, however meagre it was. He also thanked them for letting him use the toilet. It was a way of forging a connection to the men abusing him. His hope was making the environment more bearable. He wanted to appear more human.

Please help me learn Arabic. It's very important to me. These were his words to guards as an attempt to draw on their shared humanity. One guard eventually acceded to his pleas. The man asked Keith to repeat some words in a call-and-response game. What he did not realize was that the guard was mockingly converting him to Islam by making him recite the Shahada.

He said the word, I said the word. They took turns repeating the phrase until the guard declared, Okay, now you're a Muslim. Keith responded defiantly at that moment, breaking his tactic of appeasement. No, I'm not a Muslim, I'm a Jew. He stood firm on his identity despite the pressure.

Over 484 days, he said he had around 25 chances to put water on his body. He stops short of calling this ritual a shower because it involved just a bucket of water and a cup. At one point in the tunnel, he was kept with a fellow hostage and three terrorists. Between them stood only one toilet that they could flush once per day.

I don't want to get too graphic about how disgusting it was. Aviva explains her restraint on describing those conditions. She just tried not to go to the toilet as much as she could. They had locked them up in a small room, so they had to beg to use the facilities. The situation was degrading beyond words.

Keith held his breath for nearly five hundred days inside dark tunnels. He waited until the pain became too great to ignore before he could move. An Israeli soldier walks past a damaged house in Kibbutz Kfar Azza on October 27, 2023. The violence left gunshots and blood stains on doors and walls where civilians were killed just days earlier by Hamas militants.

Originally a close-knit cooperative of 950 residents, the tragedy took some 64 lives that day. Another 19 people were taken hostage, changing the fabric of the community forever. By late February, Keith was handed over to the Red Cross on February 1, 2025. They delivered him to IDF soldiers who escorted him into Israel as part of phase one of a mediated ceasefire-hostage release deal.

Keith was reunited with Aviva and their four children – Shai, Gal, Elan, and Shir. The family would never return to Kibbutz Kfar Aza, the border community decimated by the October 7 attacks. 'If you need to go to the toilet in the middle of the night, you don't want to agitate them or get them angry,' Keith says. He worried he was so weak that he would not be able to crawl out of the tunnels.

Aviva was a kindergarten teacher and had been for 40 years by the time of the massacre. 'Lots of the 64 people that were murdered, if I didn't look after them, then I looked after the kids,' she says. 'We lost our community. We lost that home... When I'm sitting in this house, it's a home, it's got walls, but I'm not there yet.' The destruction continues to echo through their lives as they face an uncertain future without returning to their old neighborhood.