Eli Sharabi, who survived the October 7 massacre and was held hostage in Gaza, briefed the ambassadors who sat in the UN Security Council about his experience.
By Rachel Avraham
Eli Sharabi, who survived the October 7 massacre and was held hostage in Gaza, briefed the ambassadors who sat in the UN Security Council about his experience. His entire speech was published in the Times of Israel.
In his speech, Sharabi proclaimed, “My name is Eli Sharabi. I am 53 years old. I’ve come back from hell. I’ve returned to tell my story. I used to live in Kibbutz Be’eri with my British-born wife, Lianne, and my daughters, Noiya and Yahel. It was a beautiful community. We were all passionate about creating the best life for our children and for our neighbors. At 16, I left Tel Aviv for Be’eri seeking a peaceful home, away from the concrete city. I found a loving community and knew I would raise my family there.”
Sharabi proclaimed that many asked him why he chose to live near Gaza, but he claimed that for him prior to October 7th, Kibbutz Be’eri “was heaven. Lianne came from Bristol, UK as a volunteer. She was meant to stay a few months, but she met me and we fell in love. We were married for 23 years and had two wonderful daughters and a dog, Mocha.”
However, Sharabi declared that on October 7th, his heaven was instantly transformed into hell: “Sirens began. Hamas terrorists invaded. And I was ripped away from my family, never to see them again. For 491 days, I was kept mostly underground in Hamas terror tunnels, chained, starved, beaten, and humiliated. I was held captive in the darkness, isolated from the world by Hamas terrorists. They took pleasure in our suffering. I survived on scraps of food with no medical attention and no mercy. When I was released, I weighed just 44 kilos. I had lost over 30 kilos, nearly half my body weight.”
Despite the dire conditions he found himself in, Sharabi proclaimed that he held onto hope for 491 days: “I imagined the life we would rebuild. I dreamt of seeing my family again. Only when I returned home, I learned the truth. My wife and my daughters had been slaughtered by Hamas terrorists on October 7.”
Sharabi explained his decision to address the UN Security Council: “I’m here today, less than six weeks after my release. To speak for those still trapped in that nightmare. For my brother Yossi, murdered in Hamas captivity, his body still held hostage. For Alon Ohel, still 50 meters underground, I swore to him that I would tell his story. For Hersh, Ori, Eden, Carmel, Almog and Alexander, murdered in cold blood by their captors. For every hostage still in Hamas hands. I’m here to tell you the whole truth.”
“On the morning of October 7, at 6:29 a.m., the red alerts began to come through on Lianne’s phone,” Sharabi recounted. “I told her not to worry. It will be over soon, I said. Minutes later, we heard that terrorists were infiltrating our community. They were inside the kibbutz. Again, I reassured her, the army will come. They always come.”
“We heard gunfire, screaming, explosions,” Sharabi noted. “And then we heard the terrorists at our door. We had no weapons, no way to fight back. Lianne and I made a decision we would not resist. We hoped we could save our daughter. The door opened, our dog barked, the terrorists opened fire. Lianne and I threw ourselves over our daughters, screaming for the terrorists to stop. Suddenly, 10 terrorists were inside my home. They took our phones. Two of them grabbed me.”
Sharabi recounted that Hamas took his wife and daughters to the kitchen: “I couldn’t see them anymore. I didn’t know what was happening to them. I was screaming their names, and they were screaming mine. I told Lianne not to be afraid. But this was fear beyond anything I’ve ever felt.”
Sharabi recounted that he was taken hostage alive: “As they dragged me out, I called out to my girls: “I will be back.” I had to believe that. But that was the last time I ever saw them. I didn’t know I should have said goodbye, forever.”
Sharabi described the conditions in Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7th: “Outside was like a war zone. My peaceful home, my slice of heaven was gone. I saw over a hundred terrorists filming themselves, celebrating, laughing, partying in our gardens as they massacred my friends and neighbors. They dragged me out, they dragged me to the door, to the border, beating me the whole way.”
“My face was swollen, my ribs bruised,” he recounted. “When we arrived in Gaza, a mob of civilians tried to lynch me. They pulled me from the car, but the terrorists rushed me away into a mosque. I was their trophy. I thought about Lianne, Noiya, and Yahel. Were they still alive? For the first 52 days, I was held in an apartment. I was tied up with ropes. My arms and legs were tied so tightly, the ropes tore into my flesh. I was given almost no food, no water, and I couldn’t sleep. The pain was unbearable. Sometimes I would just faint from the pain, only to wake up to that pain again and again.”
“Then, on November 27, 2023, Hamas took me into a tunnel, 50 meters underground,” Sharabi added. “Again, the chains were so tight, they ripped my skin. They never took them off. Not for a single moment. Those chains tore at me until the day I was released. Every step I took was no more than 10 centimeters. Every walk to the bathroom took an eternity. I cannot begin to describe the agony. It was hell.”
According to Sharabi, “I was fed a piece of pita a day, maybe a sip of tea. Hunger consumed everything. They beat me, they broke my ribs. I didn’t care. I just wanted a piece of bread. There was never enough food. Sometimes, if we begged enough, we would get something extra. We had to choose an extra piece of pita or a cup of tea. Sometimes, they threw us dry dates, and it felt like the greatest gift in the world.”
Sharabi recounted: “We had to beg for food, beg to use the bathroom. Begging was our existence. We strategized over every meal. One day, I cut myself with a razor, just to make them believe I was injured. I collapsed on my way to the bathroom, so they would think I was too weak and encourage them to give us more food. It worked. They gave us more food. We survived of those small victories.”
“Do you know what it means to open a refrigerator,” Sharabi asked the ambassadors in the audience. “It is everything. To be able to reach and take a piece of fruit, an egg, a piece of bread. I dreamt of this simple act every day. For months, we lived like this. I stopped counting the days.”
“Living as a hostage, you don’t know how the day will begin, nor how it will end, whether you’ll live or die,” Sharabi explained. “At any moment, they could beat you. At any moment, they could kill you. You wake up every day and do not know when you will be able to eat. It could be 12 p.m., 5 p.m., 11 p.m. This would be the only meal we would have. You hope and pray that there will be no surprises with the captors.”
According to Sharabi, “You think about how desperately you want to shower. We only got one bath a month, with half a bucket of cold water. Toothpaste, toilet paper — forget it. Psychological terror was constant. Every day they told us: “The world has abandoned you. No one is coming.” By the time I met Alon Ohel, who is now 24 years old, we had already endured terrible captivity. We relied on each other for survival. Alon is a very talented pianist. And I remember how we would pretend to play the piano on his body to keep himself sane.”
(Sharabi holds up a poster of Alon.)
“He doesn’t look any more like that,” Sharabi stressed.
Sharabi recounted: “One day, a terrorist took his anger out on me. He stormed in and beat me so badly that he broke my ribs. I couldn’t properly breathe for months. Alon tried to protect me with his own body. You couldn’t believe how lucky I felt when Alon told me he had saved one painkiller pill. He gave it to me to get through the night.”
“Alon still has shrapnel in his right eye from the day he was kidnapped,” Sharabi added. “He never received medical care. He never saw the Red Cross. To this day, he is blind in that eye. When I was released, he grabbed onto me, terrified to be left behind. He told me he was happy for me. I promised him it was just a matter of days before he would be home too. I was wrong.”
Sharabi added that just before his release, Hamas took pleasure in showing him a picture of his brother Yossi and he showed his picture to the audience: “This is my oldest brother. Husband for Nira, a father for Yuval, Ophir, and Oren. They told me he was dead. It was like they had brought a massive hammer down on me. I refused to believe it. My brother Yossi was all heart. Those with him in captivity told me that he gave his food to others.”
“On February 8, 2025, I was released,” Sharabi stressed. “I weighed 44 kilograms. This is less than the body weight of my youngest daughter, Yahel, may her memory be a blessing. I was a shell of my former self. I still am.”
(Sharabi raises a photo of himself before he was abducted and on the day he was released.)
“I couldn’t believe how I looked,” Sharabi stressed. “I stood at that sick Hamas ceremony, surrounded by terrorists, and the crowd of so-called uninvolved civilians, hoping my wife and daughters were waiting for me. At the end of the day, I met a representative from the Red Cross. She told me, “Don’t worry, you are safe now.” Safe? How could they feel safe surrounded by terrorist monsters? Where had the Red Cross been for the past 491 days?”
Sharabi then described his experience upon arrival home in Israel: “They told me my mother and sister were waiting for me. I said, “Get me my wife and daughters.” And that was when I knew they were gone. They had been murdered.”
(Sharabi raises a photo of his family’s graves.)
“I’m here today because I survived and I prevailed,” Sharabi stressed. “But that is not enough. Not when Alon Ohel is still there. Not when 59 hostages are still there. Right now, Alon is trapped underground, alone, surrounded by terrorists who torment him. He doesn’t know if he will ever see his mother, father, his entire beloved family again.”
“I will not leave him behind,” Sharabi declared. “I will not leave anyone behind. Their time has almost run out. I’m here before you now to give my testimony and to ask, where was the United Nations? Where was the Red Cross? Where was the world?”
Sharabi then turned to the ambassadors: “I know that you’ve discussed the humanitarian situation in Gaza very often. But let me tell you, as an eyewitness, I saw what happened to that aid: Hamas stole it. I saw Hamas terrorists carrying boxes with the UN and UNRWA emblems on them into the tunnel. Dozens and dozens of boxes paid by your governments. Feeding terrorists who tortured me and murdered my family. They would eat many meals a day from the UN aid in front of us and we never received any of it.”
“When you speak of humanitarian aid, remember this: Hamas eats like kings while hostages starve,” Sharabi emphasized. “Hamas steals from civilians. Hamas blocks aid from reaching those who truly need it. Four hundred and ninety-one days. That is how long I starved. How long I was chained. How long I begged for humanity. And in all that time, no one came. And no one in Gaza helped me. No one. The civilians in Gaza saw us suffering. They cheered our kidnappers. They were definitely involved.”
Sharabi concluded: “I was freed less than six weeks ago. I met President Trump at the White House and thanked him for securing my release and many others. I appreciate his efforts to free those still held hostage by Hamas. I told him, “Bring them all home.” I met with Prime Minister Starmer at 10 Downing Street. I told him, “Bring them all home.” Now, I’m here before you at the United Nations to say: Bring them all home. No more excuses. No more delays. If you stand for humanity, prove it. Bring them home. My name is Eli Sharabi. I am not a diplomat. I am a survivor. Bring them all home, now. Thank you.”
