Freed Israeli hostage forced to dig own grave is 'growing back to his old self', father says

The father of a released Israeli hostage who was forced to dig his own grave in a Gazan tunnel by Hamas has told the BBC his son's health is "improving every day".

Avishai David was speaking after his 24-year-old son Evyatar David and two other freed hostages - Guy Gilboa Dalal and Eitan Mor - were discharged from hospital to a hero's welcome at their homes on Sunday.

"I can't explain how happy it makes me feel to see him growing back to his old self," the father added.

In August, two months before Evyatar's release, Hamas had posted a video showing him emaciated in a narrow concrete tunnel - a move that drew condemnation from Israel and many Western leaders.

Avishai David told the BBC he was happy to see his son's "vitality improving every day, his colour returning [to his face], his cheeks getting fuller".

"Thank God, he pulled through it and he's strong."

The father said he had suffered for months knowing that his son was only "80km away... and I can't help him".

"It devastated me," he said, adding that he "couldn't sleep, eat, drink properly."

In August, Evyatar's brother Ilay told the BBC the Hamas video was a "new form of cruelty".

"He's a human skeleton. He was being starved to the point where he can be dead at any moment, and he suffers a great deal," Ilay said at the time.

In the footage itself, Evyatar said: "I haven't eaten for days... I barely got drinking water." He was seen digging what he said would be his own grave.

On Sunday, cheering crowds - including many friends and neighbours - greeted Evyatar David as he returned to his hometown of Kfar Saba in central Israel.

Dr Michal Shteinman, director at Rabin Medical Centre where the three released hostages were treated, told the BBC their bodies still bore the marks of "this horrific captivity".

"We can see their blood tests... and we've also heard their stories... they are not lying. You can see the marks of this metabolic trauma. Their skin tells their story. You can see the scars and the wounds."

But Dr Shteinman added that the hostages "came back stronger than they were".

Evyatar was abducted from the Nova music festival during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023.

He and 19 other living hostages have been released by Hamas under the first phase of a US-brokered ceasefire deal earlier this month.

Hamas has also transferred 15 out of 28 deceased hostages. Thirteen were Israelis, one was Nepalese and the other Thai.

In exchange, Israel has freed 250 Palestinian prisoners and 1,718 detainees from Gaza, and returned 15 bodies of Palestinians for every Israeli hostage's remains.

The IDF launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 others hostage.

More than 68,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures are seen by the UN as reliable.