Ilay David, brother of hostage Eviatar, recounts losing contact on October 7th after a Tel Aviv festival, only to witness Hamas post videos of his brother handcuffed and dragged into Gaza. Five months later, with 134 captives still missing, David joined the Families Forum, sleeps in public squares with 100+ families, and admits authorities are failing despite his hope and humor. His story underscores the brutal theft of ordinary lives and demands urgent action to secure their release. [Automatically generated summary]
I'm 26 years old, and I'm here to talk about my brother, my younger brother, Eviatar, which is a gentle, very gentle young man Living his life, I think, to the fullest.
He's that person that... If you are his friend, you know that he's the one to go and talk to about your problems.
If you need any advice, he will always be there to listen.
And I meet his friends all the time.
Unfortunately, I didn't know his friends that good before.
But that's the story they keep telling, that right now their psychologist isn't around.
And I actually miss the most the times that we used to play together and sing together.
I play the piano, he plays the guitar, and every Friday night we sit together to play and sing.
And that's what I miss the most.
So, on October 6th, I got home to my parents' house.
It was Friday night and we had Shabbat dinner every week.
My brother was really in a hurry because he wanted to go early to the festival and built his tent and everything before the festival starts so he barely touched his food and I gave him a hug and a kiss and I said Shabbat Shalom like every week and he took my mom's car and picked up his friends and just went south and we woke up at 6 30 a.m.
on October 7th to the sirens actually We live not far from Tel Aviv, a little bit up north from
here, and the rockets got to us as well.
So we ran to the bomb shelter and my mom immediately...
...told us to go away, but they didn't know at that time what was really going on.
Nobody did.
So, we didn't panic at first.
And only at 7.42 when he sent his last message, he sent something like, we're escaping, we're going to the cars to escape.
That was his last message.
And after that, we saw what's going on on the news.
We saw all the killing.
And we saw many people are hiding.
And at 9am, one of his best friends, one of his best friends, Ron, she called her mother, crying, screaming.
About shooting around her, explosions.
And we understood that something terrible is about to happen.
I actually, at that point, I had a stupid game with my younger sister.
I asked her, what does she prefer?
A dead brother or a hostage brother?
And I was prepared in my mind for the worst.
Like I was prepared in that point to really bury my younger brother.
Um, cause that's how my mind operates.
And it's 2 p.m.
We got screenshots.
Um, just someone sent my sister, A screenshot from a video which I would like to show you.
so you can see what I saw at that moment.
And she screamed that all of us should come and see what she saw.
And we all recognized my brother immediately.
And then we asked for the full video and that person sent us two links to different videos.
Both of them Hamas posted on Telegram.
At the first one, we could see my brother being held, dragged inside Gaza by a terrorist.
And his shirt was torn and he was tied up behind his back.
And on the second video we saw him.
The screenshot was taken from that video.
We saw him beside four other young men.
They were all tied up.
Some of them were beaten.
Some of them sitting.
Some of them lying on the floor.
The cameraman was making sure that we will see their faces and recognize them.
And one of them was my brother, looking straight into the camera with primal fear, really.
I think I never saw someone that terrified in my life.
And next to him was his best friend from kindergarten.
And I felt at that moment, I felt mostly angered.
Mostly anger I think I was furious.
I was cursing like five minutes straight.
I was angry about what happened to my younger brother.
I was angry about myself because I felt like I failed.
To protect my younger sibling.
And I felt helpless, like there's nothing I can do.
Like really, the floor was crumbling under my feet.
But I think a day after that, I actually saw on TV Two women talk about another hostage and they showed a video and it was the same video clip that I saw my brother in so they left the phone number on the screen and I immediately called her and it was that other young man's older sister and I was like, I was crying to her on the phone and she was crying to me on the phone
But at that moment I understand how big this event is.
I understood that it's huge and I'm not alone in that situation.
So after the first week, which was really terrible, I joined this place, the Families Forum.
And I really, I try to do the best to fight for the life of my brother and the other hostages.
At first it felt like everybody, we connected again, all of us, all the parts of the Jewish state, Arabs and Jews and, you know, religious and non-religious.
And also us, all the hostages' family, we became, it's more than 100 families right now, and we became like a family.
Like a big community.
The saddest community ever.
And I think that's the magical things.
One of the magical things that happened here at the Hostages Families Forum.
That sense of togetherness and supporting each other I even slept a couple of weeks at the square.
We had like a family gathering there and something like 10 or 20 family members were sleeping there for several weeks.
And I keep speaking with many, many groups.
I think I spoke to more than 1,000 people in the square.
And schools and even soldiers, like everyone who was willing to come and listen.
I was there to speak with them.
And they give us also the sense of meaning that we're doing something meaningful.
So... You don't have to answer this if it's too personal, but I wonder if it's changed you religiously or spiritually or however you would answer that question.