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The 21-year-old French-Israeli woman was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 while attending a techno music festival where 270 people were killed.
Published on 12/29/2023 7:18 am Updated on 12/29/2023 7:47 am
Reading time: 2 minutes
Mia Schem, a former French-Israeli Hamas hostage, speaks on Israeli television for the first time since her release. (Screenshot from channel 13)
His face had become one of the symbols of the hostages captured by Hamas on October 7th. More than a month after her release, Mia Schem, a former French-Israeli Hamas hostage, speaks on camera for the first time since her release in an interview broadcast on private channel Channel 13 on Thursday, December 28.
With a pale face, dark circles around her eyes, and a listless look, Mia Schem sits in front of the camera, her right arm is still bandaged. The 21-year-old young woman was injured when she was kidnapped from the scene of the Tribe of Nova music festival, which she attended together with her friend Elya Toledano, also of French-Israeli origin, who was found dead in Gaza in mid-December. 270 people died in Réim that day.
She says she spent her 54 days in detention with a Hamas member and his family, “locked in a dark room, forbidden to speak, not to be seen, not to be heard.” “You are hidden,” she testifies.
Before we continue: “There is a terrorist watching you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. He rapes you with his eyes. And of course there is the fear of being raped. I was in his house, his wife.” “I was outside the room with the children. That's the only reason he didn't rape me,” explains the young woman, who was released on November 30th.
“They are all terrorists”
When the 21-year-old young woman speaks today, it is to tell her truth, with very strong words that are already making it onto the front pages of the international press: “It was important to me to tell the truth about the people who …” I live in Gaza, who they really are and what I went through. I lived through a holocaust, they are all terrorists.
In the excerpts broadcast, Mia Schem also expresses her feeling of guilt since her release with the question that concerns her: Why her and not the others? 129 hostages are still missing, including three Frenchmen.
On Friday, December 29, the Israeli army continued its offensive and bombed the south of the Gaza Strip. A Hamas delegation in Cairo is expected to discuss a three-stage Egyptian plan that includes renewable ceasefires, staggered releases of Palestinian hostages and prisoners and, ultimately, a ceasefire to end hostilities.