Israeli President Isaac Herzog and his wife, Michal Herzog, welcomed former Hamas hostage Omer Shem Tov and his mother Shelly to the President’s Residence in Jerusalem on Monday.
Shem Tov was taken hostage by Hamas terrorists at the Nova festival in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and spent 505 days in captivity before being released on Feb. 22 as part of the truce with the terror group.
“We’re so happy to see Omer back,” said Herzog. “About a month ago, he returned back home, after going through hell in Gaza. What he says and what he describes about the torment and the enormous pain, the agony and torture—this is something that every human being should listen to,” he added.
“The lesson is clear: we want all our sons and daughters back, immediately, until the last one,” said Herzog.
During the meeting, Shem Tov urged the president to “bring everyone home as soon as possible,” adding, “They are going through hell.”
Shelly, his mother, expressed the pain of all families whose loved ones remain missing, saying, “No mother—anywhere in the world—should feel as we felt. We have to bring them back home, and say no to terror.”
Michal Herzog said following the meeting that, “As an Israeli society, we will not be whole again and we won’t be able to start our rehabilitation as a society until we have them all back, those alive and those dead as well, because we need certainty for the families.”
President Herzog concluded by calling on the international community to make it clear that hostage-taking and the inhumane treatment of captives “is totally unacceptable by any norms of humanity.”
Fifty-nine hostages remain captive in the Strip after 537 days, according to official Israeli figures. At least 35 of them are believed to have died.