Former hostage Judith Raanan met with President-elect Donald Trump in Florida on Monday at his golf course in West Palm Beach. She was the first female hostage to be released from Hamas in the Gaza Strip after being kidnapped from Kibbutz Nahal Oz in the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Raanan, a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen based in the Chicago area, gave Trump a drawing she had made and described the trauma of her captivity. She expressed her trust in the incoming president and urged him to work towards a deal to free the remaining 96 hostages who have been held captive for the past 14 months.
“Please do everything possible to bring the 100 hostages home,” she said to Trump.
Hamas released Raanan, then 59, and her then-17-year-old daughter, Natalie, on Oct. 20, 2023, for “humanitarian reasons.”
Adam Boehler, Donald Trump’s special envoy for hostage affairs, previously said, “I have a strong conviction that we will bring everyone home—both those alive and those who are not. The president’s insistence on achieving this before his inauguration has already catalyzed significant progress in negotiations.”
